
s 



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Footprints of the Jesuits. 



BY 



R. W. 



THOMPSON, 



Kx-Secretary of the Navy, and Author of " The Papacy 
and the Civil Power." 



"It was very difficult, not to say impossible, that the Church could 
recover a firm or durable peace so long as the said society existed." — Pope 
Clement XIV. 

" The Jesuits, by their very calling', by the very essence of their institu- 
tion, are bound to seek, by every means, right or wrong, the destruction of 
Protestantism. This is the condition of their existence, the duty they must 
fulfill, or cease to be Jesuits." — Nicolini, of Rome. 




in 1 02 ^2 






CINCINNATI: CRANSTON & CURTS. 

NEW YORK : HUNT & EATON. 

1894. 



V, 







COPYRIGHT 

BY CRANSTON & CURTS, 

1S94. 



PREFACE. 



The civil institutions of the United States could 
not have been formed without the separation of Church 
and State, and could not continue to exist if they were 
again united. Christianity could not maintain its prim- 
itive purity if politics and religious faith were mingled 
together; nor could the State preserve its capacity to 
provide for the general welfare if subjected to the do- 
minion of ecclesiastical authority. Our success as a 
nation is mainly attributable to the fact that these sen- 
timents are deeply imbedded in the American mind. 

A party pledged to restore to the pope the temporal 
power which the Italian people have taken away, must 
necessarily be politico-religious in character, because it 
proposes to interfere with the temporal affairs of one of 
the European nations. And if the attempt to do this 
is justified upon the ground that such restoration in- 
volves religious duty, any one can see that the obliga- 
tion is the same in the United States as in Italy, for the 
laws of God do not shift to suit the exigencies of human 
affairs. 

In the times before the Reformation the temporal 
affairs of Governments were required to conform to the 
commands of the ecclesiastical authority — that is, the 
pope — and it was held to be a necessary and essential 
part of religion that this union should be continued, no 
matter what might be the degree of popular ignorance 
and humiliation. The founders of our Government 
started out upon a different theory, believing it to be 

3 



4 PREFACE. 

their duty to separate "the things of God" from "the 
things of Csesar," so that each could reach perfection in 
its own distinct sphere. Therefore, it is clear that a 
politico-religious party in this country, pledged to unite 
Church and State in Italy, against the expressed will of 
the Italian people, not only must oppose one of the fun- 
damental principles of our Government, but disturb the 
public peace. 

To my mind it is also clear that a nation acts polit- 
ically, and not religiously, when it decides upon the 
structure of its temporal Government — that is, whether 
its affairs shall be managed by an absolute or elective 
monarch, or by machinery provided by a written consti- 
tution. I have, therefore, refrained from the discussion 
or criticism of religious belief — as it is understood in 
the American sense — any further than it is made the 
pretext for the reversal of. this opinion, so generally 
prevalent in this country. It would be an evil day for 
the people of the United States if they should be per- 
suaded to permit any power whatsoever, whether tempo- 
ral or spiritual, at home or abroad, to share with them 
any portion of their political authority, or to dictate, in 
any degree, the measures of their civil polity. 

In reminding those into whose hands this volume 
may chance to fall, of their obligations of citizenship 
under our popular form of government, I have found it 
absolutely necessary to portray the character of the Jes- 
uits, but for whom, in my opinion, there would be but 
little to disturb us. This society has nothing in common 
with American ideas or principles. It represents mon- 
archism in its most despotic and obnoxious form, by 
requiring each of its members to impersonate the most 
abject servility, and to accept this humiliation as an ab- 
solutely necessary part of religious faith. It has had a 



PREFACE. 5 

history unlike that of any other society in the world. 
In pointing out its origin and tracing its footprints 
among the nations, I have relied upon the most un- 
doubted authority, much of which is furnished by Jesuit 
authors. A careful examination of the evidence will 
leave the mind of the reader in no doubt as to the 
odium which rested upon the society from the beginning, 
as well as the manner in which it has disturbed the 
quiet of the nations, defied the popes themselves when 
adverse to them, and disregarded the interest, welfare, 
and harmony of the Church it professed to serve, when 
required by its general. 

I have deemed it important to trace out some of the 
leading events which have transpired under the pontifi- 
cates of Gregory XVI, Pius IX, and Leo XIII, up to 
the present time. In this way only is it possible to 
understand the full meaning of the revolution which led 
to Italian unity and the overthrow of the temporal power 
of the pope by Roman Catholic populations, and what 
is involved in the demand for its restoration. In doing 
this I have considered only such matters as are politico- 
religious, in the sense common among the people of the 
United States, and which can not be made a part of re- 
ligious faith without doing violence to the recognized 
spirit of our civil institutions. Thus I have avoided 
any conflict with those who prefer the Roman Catholic 
to the Protestant form of religious belief, for the express 
reason that I have neither the purpose nor desire to 
question their right to do so. It seems to me that the 
constitutional guarantee which protects this right ought 
to be satisfactory to all, and can not be disturbed with- 
out imperiling our Government. Therefore, all I desire 
will be accomplished if I shall succeed in convincing 
thoughtful Roman Catholics that it will be far better 



6 PREFACE. 

for all of us if they shall decline to accept the politico- 
religious teachings of the Jesuits as a part of their re- 
ligious faith, and content themselves without interference 
with the political affairs of their Christian brethren in 
Italy. They may maintain fidelity to the Government 
as patriotically as professed Protestants, without abating 
their devotion to the spiritual doctrines which prevailed 
in their Church before the fall of the Roman Empire 
enabled the popes to place the crown of temporal royalty 
upon their heads. To this end I would, if permitted, 
appeal to that portion of our population in all sincerity, 
and invoke the exercise of their intelligence no less 
than their patriotism. And if any of them shall peruse 
this volume, and carefully consider its contents, they 
will see that what I have written centers in the hope 
that the Protestants and Roman Catholics of the United 
States shall live together in the concord of Christian 
fellowship, emulating each other in those things that 
shall tend most to promote their mutual happiness, and 
preserve for their common posterity the civil and relig- 
ious liberty guaranteed by our Constitution and laws. 

There are abundant evidences to show that the Jes- 
uits have adopted a loose code of morality, upon which 
they have built up a system of" moral theology" as irrec- 
oncilable with the true teachings of the Roman Catholic 
religion as they are with the well-established doctrines 
of all Protestant Christians. But I have refrained from 
any discussion of these, not only because this is suffi- 
ciently done by Pascal and Bert, in France, and by nu- 
merous American authors, but because my main object 
is to show that the triumph of the Jesuits in this coun- 
try would bring about such a condition of things as 
would imperil our civil institutions. They teach as 
religious doctrines necessary to salvation the following: 



PREFACE. 7 

That the State must be reunited with the Church, and 
be required to obey its spiritual commands in the enact- 
ment of laws; that the Roman Catholic religion shall 
be established by law as the only true religion, and 
every other form of religious belief treated and punished 
as heresy ; that, along with this destruction of the free- 
dom of religious belief, there must be corresponding re- 
strictions placed upon the liberty of speech and of the 
press; that the Roman Catholic Church shall be recog- 
nized as an organization exempt from obedience to all 
our laws relating to the ownership and management of 
real property; that the clergy of that Church shall be 
also exempt from obedience to the laws as other citi- 
zens, and shall obey only such as the pope may pre- 
scribe; and that our common-school system of education 
must be absolutely and entirely destroyed. If, in these 
things, the Jesuits should obtain success, our Govern- 
ment would necessarily come to an end; and what this 
volume contains has been written alone with the view 
of making this question plain and palpable to the ordi- 
nary reader. I have written from the standpoint of an 
American citizen, thoroughly impressed with the belief 
that this is the most prosperous country in the world, 
and not from that of a theologian. About the duties 
and obligations of the former to the Government, I as- 
sume to have learned something from both instinct and 
education ; but about the metaphysical subtleties of the 
theologians, I do not trouble myself. 

I know how difficult it is to escape the accusation of 
a persecuting spirit from those who, like the Jesuits, 
allow nothing for honest differences of opinion. This, 
however, ought not to be permitted to interfere with 
the plain and obvious duty of defending our civil insti- 
tutions from any assault made upon them, no matter by 



8 PREFACE. 

whom, or in whose name, the assailing forces shall be 
marshaled. With the consciousness, therefore, that this 
volume may subject me to the imputation of unchar- 
itableness from some upon whom I would inflict no 
injury in return, I have expressed myself with candor 
and fairness, and have written nothing in malice. 

R. W. T. 

Teere Haute, 1894. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

INTRODUCTORY. 

Abolition of the Pope's Temporal Power — The Pope commands 
its Restoration — Organization for that Purpose — Duties of 
American Citizens, 15 

CHAPTER II. 

IGNATIUS LOYOLA, FOUNDER OF THE ORDER. 

Ignatius Loyola, the Founder of the Jesuit Society — His Original 
Purpose to reform the Church, and to establish his Society 
in Paelstine — Having failed, he was compelled to have it ap- 
proved by the Pope — This was done by Paul III, after the 
Constitution was amended, 32 

CHAPTER III. 

THE CONSTITUTION OF THE SOCIETY. 

(The Constitution of the Jesuits) Entirely Monarchical — Substi- 
tutes the General for God upon Earth — Sin committed with 
out Offense when the General commands it — The General In- 
dependent of the Pope — The Society obey him alone, . . 49 

CHAPTER IV. 

GOVERNMENT OF THE SOCIETY. 

Loyola, a " Soldier of Fortune " — His Monarchical Government — 
His Unpopularity among the Dominican Monks — is Plot- 
tings against the Franciscans at Saragossa and Condemna- 
tion by the Church Authorities — His Success Accomplished 

only by aid of Monarchical Power, 66 

9 



10 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTEE V. 

STRUGGLES AND OPPOSITION'. 

Conduct of the Jesuits at Toledo in Spain— Opposition of the 
Church Authorities to them — They again get Protection from 
Royal Power— The Effort to get into France—Opposition of 
the French People to them— Long Continued Struggle, . 84 

CHAPTER VI. 

THE STRUGGLE FOR FRANCE. 

Continued Struggle of the Jesuits to get into France— Resisted 
by the Parliament — Their Intrigues and Reliance upon Royal 
Power— Council at Poissy— Attended by the Jesuit General, 
who suppressed Discussion with Protestants— Their Reliance 
upon Catharine de Medicis— Her Aid in the St. Bartholo- 
mew Massacre, 99 

CHAPTER VII. 

THE SOCIETY ENTERS GERMANY. 

Jesuit Efforts to get into Germany— Less Difficulty than in 
France— When they reached there, Protestants and Roman 
Catholics living in Peace— Jesuit German College at Rome- 
Teaching Treason to German Youth as a Religious Duty, 114 

CHAPTER VIII. 

THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 

Plottings of the Jesuits in England— Their Opposition to Relig- 
ious Toleration— Opposition to Elizabeth by the Pope, and her 
Trial at Rome — Papal Decree dethroning her, and releasing 
the English People from their Allegiance to her, .... 130 

CHAPTER IX. 

JESUIT INFLUENCE IN INDIA. 

Jesuit Mission to India— Imposition of Xavier upon the Monks at 
Goa — His Pretended Miracles, 152 

CHAPTER X. 

IN PARAGUAY. 

The Jesuits in Paraguay— Their Government of the Indians— Their 
Resistance to the Authority of the Spanish and the Portu- 
guese Governments, 168 



CONTENTS. 11 

CHAPTER XI. 

THE PORTUGUESE AND THE JESUITS. 

Conflict between the Portuguese and the Jesuits — Charges 
against them laid before the Pope, Benedict XIV — Investiga- 
tion ordered by him, 183 

CHAPTER XII. 

IDOLATROUS USAGES INTRODUCED. 

Jesuits become Idolaters by the Worship of Brahma in India, 
and of Confucius in China, 196 

CHAPTER XIII. 

PAPAL SUPPRESSION OP THE SOCIETY. 

Clement XIII was compelled by Public Opinion to Promise the 
Suppression of the Jesuits, but was murdered — They were 
suppressed by Clement XIV, who was poisoned — His Decree 
of Suppression, 217 

CHAPTER XIV. 

RE-ESTABLISH MEN T. 

The Jesuits evade the Decree of the Pope suppressing them, and 
seek Shelter in Russia and Prussia — They were re-established 
by Pius VII, to aid the "Allied Powers" to perpetuate 
Monarchism, 236 

CHAPTER XV. 

p RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 

The Jesuits re-enter Spain — They support Ferdinand VII in 
trampling upon the Constitution — They arouse a Revolution- 
ary Spirit among the People, 257 

CHAPTER XVI. 

REVOLUTIONS IN SOUTHERN EUROPE. 

Retrogressive Policy of Gregory XVI — He holds the Italians in 
Subjection by the Austrian Army — Is succeeded by Pius IX 
during the Revolution, 282 



12 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XVII. 

TEMPORAL POWER OF THE POPE OVERTHROWN. 

Pius IX unable to quiet the Revolution — He drives the Jesuits 
out of Italy — Italy unites with Sardinia — Italian Independ- 
ence established, and the Temporal Power of the Pope abol- 
ished — Terms of Conciliation proposed by Victor Emmanuel, 
and rejected by the Pope — The New Government anathe- 
matized, > 306 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

PAPAL DEMANDS. 

Distinction between the Church and the Papacy — Allocution of 
Pius IX — Demand for the Restoration of the Temporal 
Power — An Act of Infallibility — Leo XIII elected — Educated 
by the Jesuits — Refused to be reconciled to Modern Prog- 
ress — His Encyclical — Demands Temporal Power — Prefers 
the Middle Ages— His Jesuit Training, 329 

CHAPTER XIX. 

PRESENT ATTITUDE OP THE PAPACY. 

The Faithful in the United States required to organize to restore 
the Temporal Power — That Question an International One — 
Its Opposition to the Policy of this Country — Opinion of 
Leo XIII upon Freedom of the Press — He condemns Separa- 
tion of Church and State — Politico-Religious Questions, . 347 

CHAPTER XX. 

THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 

Doctrines maintained by Leo XIII before he became Pope — The 
Union of Church and State— Absolute Obedience to the 
Church, 366 

CHAPTER XXI. 

THE CHURCH SUPREME. 

The Church the Mistress of all Nations— Its Right to command 
Universal Obedience— The School Question— Mgr. Satolli, the 
Vice-Pope— His Theory as dictated by the Pope— Our Com- 
mon Schools Heretical— Must be superseded by Parochial 
Schools, where Religion is taught, 388 



CONTENTS. 13 

CHAPTER XXII. 

JESUITICAL TEACHINGS. 

Doctrines of Thomas Aquinas — Also those of the Jesuits — De 
jure and de facto Governments — The United States the Latter, 
and may be resisted — Persistence in these Teachings, . . 407 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

PAPAL INFALLIBILITY. 

The Decree of Infallibility — Its Passage by the Vatican Council — 
Its Definition and Meaning — Extends the Jurisdiction of the 
Pope — Gives him Authority over Politico-Religious Ques- 
tions throughout the World, 427 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

THE CHURCH AND LITERATURE. 

Papal Teachings by Means of Literature — Arraignment of Ameri- 
can Institutions — Attack upon the Liberties of the People — ■ 
Free Institutions are Heretical — Religion requires their 
Overthrow, 443 

CHAPTER XXV. 

INTRIGUES AND INTERPRETATIONS. 

The Temporal Power Hurtful to the Church — Has led to its Dis- 
integration — Maintained by Oppressions — Designed to check 
the Reformation — Infallibility Essential to it — Jesuit Influ- 
ence in the Council of Trent — Perversions of Scripture — In- 
fallibility not decreed by the Council of Trent, 463 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

CONCLUSION. 

The Vatican Council — Effect of the Decree of Infallibility — The 
Bull Unam Sanctam of Boniface VIII — Absolute Dominion 
over Peoples and Nations — Necessity of Guarding against it 
in the United States— Importance of Common Schools — The 
Duty of keeping them free from Jesuit Control, .... 479 



Footprints of the Jesuits. 



CHAPTER I. 

INTRODUCTORY. 



The American people have imbibed, from association, the 
spirit of their civil institutions, and are ready at all times to 
repel any direct assault upon them. They are, however, so 
actively engaged in their various pursuits, that multitudes 
of them fail to realize the necessity of inquiring whether the 
conflict between opposing principles of government which re- 
sulted in our national independence, has or has not ended — 
whether, in other words, the victory the founders of the Re- 
public won over monarchism, is or is not final. 

Those who won this victory intended to provide against 
this seeming want of vigilance by means of some system of 
education, which should assimilate the principles and opin- 
ions of the people, as a perpetual bulwark against aggression. 
This would have been accomplished long ago if the paternal 
counsels of Presidents Washington and Madison had been 
heeded as they deserved to be, — that we should educate 
"our youth in the science of government," 1 under the au- 
spices and protection of national authority. Instead of this, 
we have considered ourselves sufficiently shielded by our sys- 
tem of public-school education, under State control, and 
have mainly relied upon this to fit our children for citizen- 
ship and self-government. Hitherto, we have not been se- 

1 Washington's Eighth and Madison's Second Message. 

15 



16 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

riously disturbed by the apprehension that it would result in 
failure, and for that reason it has been maintained with great 
popular unanimity. It is now, however, assailed with vio- 
lence, and, manifestly, with the purpose of destroying it en- 
tirely. Hence, we are all required, by obligations we can 
not rightfully evade, to rest long enough from our active 
avocations to discover, if possible, why this is — what motives 
impel the assailants — and whether or no they desire to sub- 
stitute other principles of government for ours, by turning 
us back upon a course we have solemnly repudiated. 

In addition to other works of like character but less 
ability, there is one, extensively circulated in this country, 
from the pen of a writer conspicuous for his learning and 
ability. The author asserts without disguise that what he 
calls "Catholicity" — that is, what the Roman popes taught 
when they were temporal monarchs — has been more bene- 
ficial to the world and more civilizing in its influences upon 
mankind than Protestantism, not alone in a social, but in a 
political, religious, and literary point of view. His argument 
proceeds from the Jesuit standpoint, and may be summed 
up in a single sentence, — that Protestantism has placed man- 
kind in a far worse condition than they were when domi- 
nated over by papal kings. 2 

This work was intended to counteract the effect produced 
by the writings of Guizot, the great French historian, who 
maintained, by eloquent and matchless reasoning, that man- 
kind had been improved, in every point of view, by the in- 
fluences of Protestantism. Accordingly, it was translated 
from Spanish, in which language it was originally written, 
into French and German, and extensively circulated in 
France and Germany. It soon acquired the reputation 
among the Jesuits of being unanswerable, and on that ac- 
count was regarded, in the conflict between progress and 
retrogression, like heavy ordnance in battle — a suitable 
weapon with which to attack Protestantism and its institu- 

2 Protestantism and Catholicity Compared in their Effects on 
the Civilization of Europe. By the Rev. I. Balmes. 



INTRODUCTORY. 17 

tions in the seat of its greatest strength. There&re it was 
translated into the English language, and printed by two pub- 
lishing-houses in the United States, for circulation among 
the American people. An American preface is attached, 
wherein these propositions are affirmed: First, that Protest- 
antism compels its votaries to infidelity, by its variations of 
belief; second, that civilization was not only commenced but 
was prospering under " Catholicity," when it was retarded 
by Protestantism, which is unfavorable and injurious to it; 
and, third, that the principles of Protestantism are incompat- 
ible with the happiness of mankind and ''unfavorable to 
civil liberty." 

This preface — which manifestly bears the Jesuit impress — 
was intended to notify American readers, beforehand, that 
the three foregoing propositions are maintained in the body 
of the work, and to prepare their minds for the acceptance 
of them. Its reprint and circulation in the United States 
could have had no other object than to inculcate the belief 
that what the people of this country have supposed to be 
the advantages they have derived from Protestant institu- 
tions are, in fact, absolutely injurious to them, and that 
their condition would be improved by the revival of such as 
existed during the Middle Ages, before the Reformation. 

By giving prominence to political matters, and discussing 
them from the Jesuit point of view, this author presents a 
plain, distinct, and practical issue between progress and ret- 
rogression. He intends to make it as plain to the minds of 
his readers as it seems to be to his own, that Governments 
constructed upon the monarchical plan confer more happiness 
and prosperity upon society than those upon the Protestant 
plan of self-government. Evidently it was with the hope of dis- 
seminating this belief that this work has been reprinted and 
circulated in the United States so extensively that it is be- 
lieved to have become a standard authority among the Jesuit 
enemies of Protestantism. If it does nothing else, however, 
it apprises our Protestant population that a powerful influ- 
ence exists among them which is uncompromisingly hostile 

2 



18 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

to the principles which underlie the whole structure of their 
Government. And, being thus apprised, their indifference 
would be little less than criminal ; because their adroit 
aggressors would construe it into fear of possible conse- 
quences, or assign it to their inability to combat successfully 
the arguments supplied by this work, whose author is an ac- 
knowledged monarchist. 

The differences between popular and monarchical govern- 
ments are well known, and appear at every point of compar- 
ison which has arisen during the course of events since the 
Keformation of the sixteenth century. The former have 
achieved their completest triumphs where Protestantism pre- 
vails, and in its presence the latter have been compelled 
either entirely to surrender their pretensions, or to abate 
their demands for absolutism. Until the Reformation became 
an accomplished fact, monarchism was maintained by uniting 
Church and State, and employing their joint authority to 
coerce obedience from the multitude. The dominion thus 
acquired condemned self-government by the people as both 
heresy and treason, punishable at the pleasure of those who 
held the reins of authority in their hands. It took many 
years of conflict to change this condition of affairs ; and 
when the people of the United States were, in the course of 
events, placed in a condition to choose between this coercive 
system and that which was the natural outgrowth of Protest- 
antism, and to construct a Government for themselves, their 
wisdom was sufficient to assure them that any plan of gov- 
ernment they adopted would result in failure, unless they 
distinguished between their politics and their religion by sep- 
arating the Church from the State, and by so framing their 
civil institutions as to reserve to themselves alone the entire 
sovereignty over them. If either of these essential prerequi- 
sites had been omitted, all exertions to better and improve 
their condition would have resulted in failure, as all readers 
of history know. Instead of failure, however, they created 
a Government which has survived the vicissitudes of more 
than a hundred years, is now supplying protection to more 



INTRODUCTORY. 19 

than sixty millions of people, and has reached a most com- 
manding position among the leading nations; if, indeed, its 
influence over the happiness and prosperity of mankind does 
not surpass that of any of them. Of this we may be assured, 
that the measure of its success has been such as to incite 
among other peoples the desire to imitate its example; and 
that the conflicts of opinion which now agitate the world 
give reasonable promise that the popular right of self-gov- 
ernment may, in less than another century of time, be uni- 
versally recognized. To this end the American people are 
obliged to contribute by warding off every blow aimed at 
their institutions by either domestic or alien adversaries, es- 
pecially when these blows are aimed, as some of them are, 
at the fundamental principles of their government. 

The influence of our example finds a striking illustration 
in the revolution in Italy in 1870, which abolished the tem- 
poral power, or kingship, of the pope, separated the State 
from the Church, and established a constitutional form of 
government in place of the absolute monarchism which had 
prevailed, almost uninterruptedly, for many centuries. The 
fires of this revolution had been burning for a long time, 
kindled originally by oppressions, which had been so magni- 
fied that the people could endure them no longer. Their 
culminating point was the passage of the Conciliar Decree, 
called a "Dogmatic Constitution," whereby it was declared 
that the pope was infallible, and could not err in matters per- 
taining to faith or morals; that is, within such spheres of 
governmental, social, and individual duties and obligations 
as the pope alone, for the time being, should decide to be 
included in his spiritual and pontifical jurisdiction. This act 
was considered the consummation of the " Jesuit plan," at 
which the Italian people had been so incensed but a short 
time before, that Pope Pius IX had been compelled to expel 
the members of that odious society from Rome. The conse- 
quence was that the fires which popular indignation had kin- 
dled grew hotter, and it became impossible to extinguish them 
except by assuring complete success to the revolution. There- 



20 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

fore, the ink with which this decree of papal infallibility was 
written was scarcely dry before the Italian people, with ex- 
traordinary unanimity, determined to reject it, not merely 
because it was the introduction of a new principle of faith 
hitherto unrecognized, but because they could easily see that 
it would place them, and their children after them, under 
Jesuit dominion and dictation. They realized that its accept- 
ance would involve them in the obligation to submit to the 
absolute temporal rule of the pope, in whose selection they 
had no voice, and to those whom he should think proper to 
put over them, whether fit or unfit, and thus put an end to 
all popular demands for the right of political self-government. 
It involved no question of religious faith, as the faith had 
been handed down to them by their fathers; nothing what- 
soever which involved their duty to God, otherwise than as 
presumptuous men, to answer their own selfish ends, were 
striving to convert the pope into a God upon earth, and 
themselves into his plenipotentiaries. Influenced solely by 
this conviction, and stimulated by the success the people of 
the United States had won, they merely abolished the tempo- 
ral power of the pope, and created a constitutional form of 
civil government, which places satisfactory limitations upon 
the authority of their king, and establishes representative 
political institutions, which provide that their voice shall be 
heard in the enactment of public laws. In this they have 
taken a long stride in the direction of government "of the 
people, for the people, and by the people." They have cast 
off political absolutism — which the Jesuits commend to us as 
"Catholicity" — and have assumed the station and dignity of 
an independent people. They have converted a priest-ridden 
oligarchy into a nation. On this account, and this alone, 
they have made themselves the special objects of Jesuit ma- 
levolence, for the simple reason that the monarchical society 
of Jesuits has never, since its beginning, relented in its vin- 
dictive opposition to every form of civil government which 
recognizes the people as the source of political power. By 
the most fundamental principles of its organization it is for- 



INTRODUCTORY. 21^ 

bidden to sympathize with the sentiment of personal inde- 
pendence, or to allow its members to acquire the dignity 
of manhood necessary for participation in the affairs of 
government. 

In the face of the fact that the Italian people have not 
changed the religious convictions they have maintained for 
hundreds of years with steadfast fidelity, and in the face 
also of the successes of Protestantism as universally recog- 
nized, the Jesuits employ the extorted decree of papal in- 
fallibility as the basis of an argument to prove that the pope 
is divinely endowed with such spiritual sovereignty over na- 
tions and peoples as entitles him to prescribe, at his own 
personal will and pleasure, such laws and regulations, con- 
cerning both faith and morals, as are necessary for the gov- 
ernment of society and the conduct of individuals through- 
out the world. Within the circle of this extraordinary and 
unlimited jurisdiction, they make no distinction between 
spirituals and temporals, — never failing to make the power 
over the former sufficiently comprehensive to embrace the 
latter, accordingly as the pope himself shall decide. Hence 
they infer that this papal jurisdiction is not subject to any 
other limitation than such as he shall establish, and that it 
may, consequently, be rightfully enlarged so as to exact sub- 
mission from all, and set aside all requirements in conflict 
with it. And the result they reach — as logically following 
this premise — is, that the refusal of obedience to the pope, 
within this comprehensive jurisdiction, violates the law of 
God, and is heresy. Therefore, as the Jesuits believe that 
the separation of Church and State by the Italian people is 
heresy, so they are required also to believe that all civil in- 
stitutions which have grown out of that separation — like 
those of the United States — not only have the curse of God 
resting upon them, but that they are the divinely chosen 
messengers of heaven to bring them within this enormous 
circle of papal dominion. 

In assigning these powers to the pope alone, they entirely 
ignore everything associated with the original and primitive 



22 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

organization of the Christian Church, and especially the im- 
portant fact that it was not until the beginning of the sixth 
century that the bishop of Rome succeeded in acquiring the dis- 
tinctive title of pope. 3 Before that time they had exercised at 
Rome only such powers as metropolitan bishops elsewhere — 
each of them having been called papa or pope. When the 
Roman bishop acquired by usurpation the exclusive title oi 
the pope, the other metropolitan bishops were reduced to a con- 
dition of inferiority and subordination, and he then required 
only the temporal power to assure to him the power and juris- 
diction the Jesuits now claim for him. It took several hundred 
years of conflict within the Churches and with the civil powers 
to accomplish this, and was only accomplished at last by 
subduing impotent kings, and so uniting the power of the 
Church with that of the State as to hold ignorant popula- 
tions in subjugation. And now that the Italians, after sub- 
mitting to this humiliation for more than a thousand years, 
and finding all the sources of their prosperity withered up, 
have abolished and destroyed this illicit and usurped temporal 
power, and taken into their own hands the administration of 
their own temporal affairs — obeying the example set them by 
the people of the United States — the Jesuits employ all their 
energies to reverse this popular verdict, and plunge them 
again into the dreary chasm from which they have escaped. 
The Jesuits are subtle disputants. When they talk 
about the papacy reconciling itself to any form of government, 
they reserve to themselves the meaning that it does not in- 
terfere — either in monarchies or republics — with such local 
and limited affairs as pertain to the common and ordinary 
interests of society in the management of counties, town- 
ships, cities, and municipalities. These may be conducted 
without complaint, under one form of government as well as 
another, and are held to be such temporal affairs as the pope 
may exclude from his spiritual jurisdiction without any vio- 

3 Universal Church History. By Alzog. Vol. I, p. 674. This 
recognized papal authority, in order to he as nearly exact as possible, 
fixes it in the year 510. 



INTRODUCTORY. 23 

lation of the divine law. But when measures of public 
policy pass beyond these local and limited spheres, and in- 
volve matters which the pope shall decide to have relation 
to the Church, to the papacy, to faith, or to morals, his juris- 
diction attaches, and, according to the Jesuits, he possesses 
the divine right to regulate and direct them. So that, when 
civil institutions are constructed — no matter in what form — 
by which Church and State are separated and the freedom 
of religious belief is guaranteed, as they are by the Consti- 
tution of the United States, they are brought within this 
unlimited jurisdiction of the pope, and he may pass such 
sentence of condemnation upon them as he shall deem neces- 
sary to maintain his own infallibility, as well as his spiritual 
and temporal power. If, in the execution of this extraordi- 
nary spiritual power, the pope and the Jesuit general at Rome 
shall unite in a decree that all such institutions shall be op- 
posed, resisted, and overthrown, the Jesuit militia are always 
ready to pay obedience, because it is one of the fundamental 
maxims of their society, that when thus commanded, with 
reference to anything concerning the Church, the papacy, 
faith, or morals, disobedience is visited with divine dis- 
pleasure. 

Before he entered Rome with his victorious troops, and 
with the hope of pacifying the pope, Victor Emmanuel, the 
liberator of the Italian people, addressed an affectionate 
letter to Pope Pius IX, calling him "the chief of Catho- 
licity," and expressing the hope and intention that nothing 
should be done inconsistent " with the inviolability of the 
sovereign pontiff and of his spiritual authority, and with the 
independence of the Holy See." But this kindly spirit was 
not reciprocated by the irascible pope, who excitedly rejected 
the overture of pacification. Thereupon the victorious 
troops entered the city of Rome, and terminated the tempo- 
ral dominion of the pope, which had rested upon the Italian 
people with crushing weight for nearly fourteen hundred 
years. Then the pope, having lost his royal diadem — noth- 
ing more — and with the view of prescribing it as an article 



24 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

of faith that it should be recovered again, caused his Cardi- 
nal Secretary of State to notify Victor Emmanuel to that 
effect. This he did as follows : 

"I have the command from his holiness to declare, and 
the undersigned does hereby declare in the august name of 
his holiness, that such usurpation is devoid of all effect, is null 
and invalid, and that it can never convey any prejudice to 
the indisputable and lawful rights of dominion and of pos- 
session, whether of the holy father himself, or of his succes- 
sors in perpetuity ; and, although the exercise of these rights 
may be forcibly prevented and hindered, yet his holiness 
both knows his rights, intends to conserve them intact, and 
r -enter at the proper time into tJieir actual possession" 

These are expressive words, and every Jesuit interprets 
them to mean that, having the direct approval of an infal- 
lible pope, they impose the religious obligation of obedience 
upon all the members of their society, and that it will be 
offensive to God if they shall cease their struggle for the 
restoration of the temporal power before it is accomplished. 
Therefore they so enlarge the spiritual jurisdiction and 
authority of the pope as to make the question of the resto- 
ration of his temporal power an international one, so that he 
shall have the divine right to require all professing Chris- 
tians to obey him in all matters relating to that question, 
no matter under what Government, or in what part of the 
world they may live. The refusal of this obedience is held 
by them to be heresy. Consequently, when the Roman 
Catholic people of Italy abolished the temporal power of the 
pope, remaining in all other respects faithful to the historic and 
traditional teachings of the Church, the Jesuits made an or- 
ganized appeal to all the Roman Catholics throughout the 
world, to unite themselves into a politico-religious party, in 
order to restore the temporal power, and thereby to teach 
their Christian brethren in Italy that they have no right to 
govern themselves by laws of their own making, and that by 
irreligiously asserting that right, in imitation of the heretical 
people of the United States, they have themselves become 



INTRODUCTORY. 25 

heretics. In point of fact, the Jesuit appeal is made to pop- 
ulations entirely foreign to the people of Italy, inviting these 
foreign populations to subvert the civil institutions the latter 
have established for themselves, by forcibly substituting the 
pope as an arbitrary and irresponsible monarch, without any 
constitutional check, for a constitutional king whose powers 
have been placed under satisfactory restraint. The pope 
himself, when he realized that he was about to lose his 
crown, talked about the two hundred millions of Roman 
Catholics scattered throughout the world, who were to be 
excited to this conflict with the Italian people ; and the 
Jesuits consider themselves specially assigned to the duty of 
massing the forces of this great papal army, and directing its 
movements. In that capacity, and with that secret pur- 
pose, they have distributed themselves throughout the popu- 
lous parts of the United States, crowding into our cities, and 
employing their tireless energies in the work of educating a 
considerable portion of our people, both old and young, in 
the religious belief that it is their Christian duty to snatch 
the crown from the head of the constitutional king of Italy, 
where those of their own religious faith have placed it, and 
restore it to the pope, from whose head they removed it by 
employing the same sovereign power which the people of the 
United States invoked when they laid the foundations of 
their own institutions. 

It is a serious thing, too serious to be disregarded, to 
know that, under protection of the liberalism of our laws, 
there are scattered among our people those who are striv- 
ing to entangle us in alliances which can have no other 
end than to disturb the quiet of the nation, and endanger the 
public welfare. The sacrifices made by the American people 
in behalf of the right of self-government entitle them to be left 
to themselves in the undisturbed enjoyment of that right. 
They have shown themselves wise enough to understand the 
causes which led to the decay of former nations, and discreet 
enough to avoid them. Among these causes the union of 
Church and State has always been conspicuously prominent ; 



26 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

wherefore they found it necessary to put an end to this 
union, by leaving the Church independent in the spiritual, 
and the State equally so in the temporal sphere. This sepa- 
ration constitutes a great and important political fact, wholly 
distinct from any of the forms or principles of religious be- 
lief, and practically embodies the American idea — perpetu- 
ated in Protestantism — that the right to perfect and un- 
trammeled freedom of conscience is not derived by concession 
from either spiritual or temporal monarchs, but from the in- 
alienable laws of nature. In view of the past experience of 
mankind, it seemed clear to them that the best form of gov- 
ernment is that which guarantees this natural right to each 
individual, to be enjoyed as a political right, without any 
restraint whatsoever. In no other way can free popular gov- 
ernment ever become possible. They believed also that man- 
kind had been held long enough in inferiority and bondage 
by the combined influence of Church and State despotism, 
and that inasmuch as they had been providentially placed 
in possession of a new and undeveloped continent, it was not 
only wise but best for them and their posterity that, in 
establishing their Government, they should make the further 
union of Church and State impossible, unless some alien 
power should be strong enough to overthrow their institu- 
tions, or they should fall into decay by means of the corrup- 
tions engendered by this fatal union, as other Governments 
had fallen. It was an experiment, hitherto unsuccessful, 
and was consequently observed by multitudes throughout the 
w T orld with intense solicitude. If there were any who con- 
sidered the experiment injudicious, and likely to prove a 
failure, but little time elapsed before their doubts were dissi- 
pated by the results accomplished — results which all who are 
rightfully entitled to American citizenship, now accept as a 
precious inheritance from the founders of the Republic. Our 
institutions are no longer an experiment; they have become 
actual and accomplished reality. And it is not now the time 
for us to think of turning back to the bondage of monarch- 
ism, as we should indicate the desire to do by denying to the 



INTRODUCTORY. 27 

people of Italy the right to imitate our example by separat- 
ing Church and State, and governing themselves by laws of 
their own making. They who invite us to this are counsel- 
ors of evil. 

That the Jesuits are not content with the separation of 
Church and State is a fact too palpable for contradiction. 
Hence the readiness with which they engage in the organiza- 
tion, in this country, of a politico-religious party pledged to 
restore the pope's temporal power, notwithstanding such a 
party is condemned by the spirit of our institutions, and is 
regarded by the general public as impolitic, inexpedient, and 
hazardous ; and inasmuch as they have chosen to thrust this 
issue upon us, we are not permitted to become indifferent to 
it, or shrink from our responsibility of citizenship under a 
Government entitled to our patriotic allegiance. Such an 
issue can not be evaded, and must be met with fearlessness 
and becoming candor. If one is informed that a poisonous 
viper is coiled up under a pillow upon which he is about to 
lay his head, he will instinctively strive after the means nec- 
essary to escape its fangs. So, when apprised that cunning 
and adroit adversaries, like the Jesuits, are plotting against 
cherished and vital principles of our institutions, the obliga- 
tion to make ourselves familiar with their principles, policy, 
and history becomes imperative. Being forewarned, we shall 
have no excuse for not being forearmed. 

We must do nothing, either now or hereafter, forbidden 
by our national character, or by the liberalism we prize so 
highly. Our Constitution amply protects the rights of free 
speech, free thought, and a free press, all of which must be 
held inviolable ; but violence is manifestly done to the spirit 
of patriotism which guarantees this protection when it is de- 
manded of any portion of our population that they shall 
participate in the work of undoing, in any degree whatso- 
ever, what the founders of the Government considered fun- 
damental. We are prohibited from submitting to anything 
that shall tend, even by possibility, to subject the people to 
any sovereignty, either spiritual or temporal, higher than 



28 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

themselves, in such matters as involve their own happiness 
and welfare. It would be well, consequently, for those who 
are seeking to accomplish this, to learn that the world is 
large enough for them and us; that there are other fields 
wherein better grounds of hope are furnished for re-welding 
the fragments of shattered monarchies ; and that, when they 
avail themselves of the tolerance of our institutions to assail 
their foundations, they become intruders into a peaceful and 
harmonious circle, where, but for them, universal peace and 
quiet would prevail. 

In his conflict with the Italian people for the re-possession 
of the temporal power, by overthrowing the Constitutional 
Government they have established, the pope could not find 
another ally so formidable as the Jesuits, nor one with such 
implacable hatred of liberalism and popular government. 
Their society is so united and compact that its ranks can not 
be broken. They are everywhere the same, moved by a 
common impulse, under the dictation of their general in 
Rome. They are the deadly enemies of civil and religious 
liberty. Nothing that stands in their way can become so 
sacred as to escape their vengeance. Protestantism has borne 
no fruits to which they have ever been reconciled. They 
consider the Reformation which gave birth to it to have been 
criminal resistance to the only rightful authority upon earth — 
that which proceeds from Church and State combined. They 
believe that the condition of mankind during the Middle 
Ages, staggering under the weight of feudal oppression, was 
preferable to modern progress and enlightenment; that hu- 
man happiness would be promoted by the return to that 
period ; that the political right of self-government by the 
people can not be set up against the higher right of papal 
and monarchical power; that the progress of the advancing 
nations is delusive and uusubstantial ; and that institutions 
which guarantee civil and religious freedom, if not arrested 
by some coercive power strong enough to put an end to them, 
will lead, through heresy, to social ruin and desolation. If, 
at the period of the Reformation, this society had not been 



INTRODUCTORY. 29 

established for the express purpose of counteracting its influ- 
ence, a knowledge of the difference between primitive Chris- 
tianity and the prevailing dogmas might have led to such 
reforms as would have reconciled Christians to dwell together 
in peace and concord. But when a dove should have been 
sent forth bearing the olive-branch of Christian charity, this 
society sprang from the brain of a disappointed military ad- 
venturer, and began at once to scatter the seeds of strife and 
discord. Almost from the beginning it has been a disturber 
of the peace of nations, suffering only such as have bestowed 
patronage upon it to escape its maledictions and its plottings. 
The members of this society are numerous and powerful 
in the United States. They are constantly increasing, mainly 
by accessions from their drilled and disciplined companions 
in Europe, but also by conversions of unsuspecting young 
men, who are seduced by their vain and supercilious preten- 
sions as educators. They are, as they have always been, 
selfish and vindictive — restless under opposition, and compro- 
mising in nothing. They have neither country, nor homes, 
nor families, nor friendships beyond the limits of their order — 
none of the affections of the heart which give charm to life 
and social intercourse — being required to abandon all these 
and fit themselves for uninquiring obedience to their general, 
whose commands, whether right or wrong, good or bad, they 
have solemnly vowed to execute, without the least regard for 
consequences. Having persistently refused to become recon- 
ciled to the forms and methods of Christian civilization which 
prevail among our Protestant population, they employ all the 
resources they can command in endeavoring to arrest them. 
They insist that Church and State shall be united whereso- 
ever they are separate, and that the basis of such union shall 
be the subordination of the State to the Church. Self-gov- 
ernment by the people is held by them to be violative of the 
divine law, and on that account may rightfully be resisted as 
heretical, when its overthrow can be assured. They will 
allow no rights to exist in either States, peoples, or individ- 
uals, against what they consider the prerogatives of their so- 



30 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

ciety as defined by their general, who, in their estimation, 
possesses the divine right to enlarge or contract them at his 
own pleasure. There must be no limitation to the power 
and independence of the pope, either in the spiritual or tem- 
poral domain, except where the interests of their society 
command otherwise; they must be full, absolute, unques- 
tioned, to the extent defined by himself. His liberty must 
be such that he may, at his own discretion, curtail the liber- 
ties of all others. His spiritual sovereignty must include 
whatsoever he shall embrace within it. Neither the existence 
nor the extent of this sovereignty must be brought in ques- 
tion before any human tribunal ; but he alone shall defiue 
it, together with the character of the obedience he shall 
exact. And if, in the course of the papal economy, he should 
ever find it necessary to hold in one hand emblems of har- 
mony and peace, this restless and uncompromising society 
stands always ready to place the rod of chastisement in the 
other. 

The conflict of opinions, therefore, in which the Protest- 
ant people of the United States find themselves engaged is 
not of their own inviting. They are unwilling parties to it. 
It had its origin in the spirit of aggression which prevails 
among those who have stronger sympathy for an alien 
power than for the right of self-government, and, on account 
of their peculiar fitness for the work, it will engage every 
Jesuit tongue and pen in the land. Because of this, a sense 
of both duty and security demands that the history and 
character of this skilled and powerful adversary — alien in 
birth, growth, and sentiment — should be understood; as also 
the causes which have led to the expulsion of the Jesuits 
from every country in Europe, the public odium which has 
rested upon them for many years, their long-continued dis- 
turbance of the peace of nations, and the final suppression 
and abolition of their society by one of the best and most 
enlightened of the popes. In view of the obligation to pre- 
serve our civil institutions as they are, not only for ourselves 
and our children, but for the multitudes who shall seek shel- 



INTRODUCTORY. 31 

ter under them, we have no right to become either indiffer- 
ent or inactive in the presence of such assailants, who com- 
placently fling defiance in our faces, and seek to impregnate 
the free and pure atmosphere of our schools and seminaries 
of learniug with the poison of monarchism. "Against the 
insidious wiles of foreign influence," said Washington, "the 
jealousy of a free people ought ever to be constantly awake, 
since history and experience prove *that foreign influence is 
one of the most baneful foes of republican government." 



CHAPTER II. 

IGNATIUS LOYOLA, FOUNDER OF THE ORDER. 

It is of little consequence to the general reader what 
place in history is assigned to Ignatius Loyola, apart from 
the fact that he was the founder and originator of the soci- 
ety of Jesuits, and lived long enough to stamp upon it the 
impress of his own personality. He availed himself of that 
organization to maintain among its members the vain and 
impious assumption of his equality with God, and in that way 
obtained such complete mastery over them that, in explanation 
and justification of their slavish obedience, they represent 
him as having possessed miraculous powers. They assign to 
him the performance of more miracles than Christ, and do 
not hesitate to record that he not only restored the dead to 
life, but, in one conspicuous case, gave life to a child born 
dead ! The silly stories of this character, told of him in ap- 
parent seriousness, can have no other effect than to impose 
upon and encourage ignorant and superstitious people, and 
are undoubtedly repeated by his Jesuit biographers for this 
purpose. They seem never to have realized that the world 
has grown wiser, and that the period has passed when fictions 
and myths can be proclaimed as realities. 

The life of Loyola was written, soon after his death, by 
Rabadenira, one of his Jesuit followers, who had known him 
intimately. Of course, under such circumstances, his state- 
ment of personal characteristics was presumably reliable. 
What he stated in the first edition was professedly based upon 
his own knowledge and what he had learned from Loyola's 
"intimate friends" and " inseparable companions." And 
with these facts before him and fully considered, he de- 
clared that his "sanctity was not justified by miracles." 
Some years after, however, it was deemed expedient that 
this concession should be withdrawn entirely, and another 
32 



IGNA TIUS LO YOLA. 33 

more favorable to the Jesuits be substituted for it. Ac* 
cordingly, in another edition of the same work, it is stated 
that Loyola's performance of miracles was "confirmed by 
the most authentic proofs and careful examination." 1 These 
statements are in direct conflict, and can not both be true. 
The first bears the impress of veracity because it is consist- 
ent with human experience, while the latter shows the trac- 
ings of Jesuit fingers too clearly to mislead any thoughtful 
and intelligent mind, 

It is singularly strange that, in the present reading and 
enlightened age, these pretended miracles are cited by Jesu- 
its to prove that divine power and authority were conferred 
upon Loyola, because God chose him to accomplish special 
objects in his name; when the very things which, as they al- 
lege, he was providentially appointed to defeat, have trans- 
pired in spite of him, his successors, and all their followers. 
The suppression of the Reformation and the extirpation of 
Protestantism — its legitimate fruit — were the avowed pur- 
poses of himself and his society, because, according to them, 
the curse of God rested upon these as the excess of unpar- 
donable heresy. For the accomplishments of these objects 
he converted the members of his society into a compact body 
of militia, and placed in their hands weapons chosen by him- 
self, instructing them that they were specially selected as 
the executioners of the Divine vengeance. Yet the Ref- 
ormation progressed until it marked out new paths of ad- 
vancement for the nations ; and Protestantism has extended 
its beneficent influences until it is to-day the controlling 
power in human affairs, and has even taken possession of 
places where the papacy once ruled with sovereign and un- 
challenged authority. And the great work thus begun, in 
the face of Jesuit maledictions and curses, has not yet ended ; 
for Protestantism still continues to build up new nations, ele- 
vate and improve peoples, and make mankind freer, happier, 



1 Crit. and PH. Dictionary. By Bayle. Article "Loyola," Vol. 
Ill, p. 889, note *. 

3 



34 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

and more prosperous ; whilst there has not been a time since 
the Jesuits existed as a society when they have not been odi- 
ous in all parts of the world, and have not been regarded as 
the plotters of mischief and disturbers of the public peace. 
How can a thoughtful mind account for these results by any 
known process of human reasoning, if it were true that 
Loyola had divine power conferred upon him expressly for 
the purpose of exterminating Protestantism as heresy ? And 
how, if his society of Jesuits has been providentially en- 
dowed with faculties to consummate his ends, could it have 
happened that one of the wisest and best of the popes — for 
whom infallibility is now claimed — was constrained to con- 
demn it by positive suppression, and to declare, under the 
solemn responsibilities of his sacred office, that it was not 
worthy of longer existence ? But leaving these questions unan- 
swered for the present, it is sufficient to say here that no qual- 
ities possessed by Loyola, whatsoever they were, can oblige 
the present age to recognize his society as entitled to any 
such prerogatives and immunities as exempt it from having 
its real worth tested by the rules universally accepted as ap- 
plicable to human conduct and affairs. It must now be tried 
by these rules ; and if it shall be found that its conduct has 
been marked by wrong and injustice, its boastful claim of 
superiority will appear to every investigator as~ merely vain 
and presumptuous. 

That Loyola was shrewd and sagacious, and laid his plans 
with a full and intelligent comprehension of the ends he had 
in view, ought not to be denied. When engaged in framing 
the constitution of the Jesuits, he was familiar with the 
troubles existing in the Church, and with the prevailing pub- 
lic sentiment with reference to their causes; that is, the un- 
fitness for the proper discharge of spiritual functions of those 
charged with their exercise. The Jesuits themselves assert 
this, in explanation of the necessity for the establishment of 
theirs as a new society, declaring that the numerous orders 
then existing — such as the Benedictines, Dominicans, Fran- 
ciscans, Minorites, and others — were incompetent to arrest the 



IGNA TJUS LO YOLA. 35 

decline of the Church, on account of their own need of re- 
form. This point in their history should invite the closest 
attention and scrutiny, because it shows, in a conspicuous 
degree, the basis of their assumed superiority over all other 
societies and orders which, in the course of time, have had 
the sanction of the Church. And this scrutiny is desirable, 
moreover, inasmuch as it will be seen that the pictures of 
demoralization prevailing among the clergy, as they were 
drawn by the reformers in their most vivid coloring, had 
their accuracy vouched for by Loyola himself, to justify the 
establishment of his society of Jesuits, not merely because it 
would constitute a distinct, independent, and superior organ- 
ization, but would bring back all dissenters to obedience, 
which he made its main and fundamental principle. 

One of the leading Jesuit authorities — an author upon 
whom the society relies to make known that part of its his- 
tory considered favorable — endeavors to maintain the propo- 
sition that it was absolutely obligatory for Loyola to have 
been intrusted with the duty "of reforming the morals of 
the people of Rome," immediately within the shadow of the 
Vatican. He represents the task as "most difficult and im- 
portant, as at that time the people were much demoralized, 
and indulged in the most frightful excesses," notwithstanding 
the papal Government, with plenary and absolute powers, 
had existed there during all the period of the Middle Ages — 
nearly a thousand years. Not content alone with asserting 
that the people were demoralized, this same author affirms, 
in addition, that Loyola ' ' sought to reform the monastic or- 
ders, and reanimate the priesthood with a holy fervor," 2 thus 
alleging that the monastic orders and the priesthood were 
demoralized like the people, and needed that a new guardian 
of their morals, other and better than any the Church had 
ever furnished, should be empowered to regulate their con- 
duct. In further explanation of the reasons why Loyola 

2 History of the Society of Jesus. By Daurignac. Vol. I, p. 14. 
This work was translated by Clements, and published in Cincinnati 
by Walsh, in 1865. 



36 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

desired to establish the society of Jesuits, he represents him 
as having addressed directly to the pope, Paul III, this ar- 
gument: "It appears that this society is absolutely neces- 
sary for the eradication of those abuses with which the 
Church is afflicted." 3 And at another place, referring to the 
condition of the Church in Germany, he says it was "mainly 
attributable to the ignorance of the people, and, more dan- 
gerous still, to the shortcomings of the priesthood, abaudoned 
to the gratification of their own passions. In the entire city 
of Worms there was but one priest worthy of respect."* 
Neither Luther nor the reformers could have employed apter 
words to justify themselves; nor can those of the present 
time, who comment upon the vices which then prevailed 
among the clergy, express themselves in stronger language. 
The well-established historical fact is, that the same condition 
of things existed throughout the leading nations of Europe, 
beginning at Rome and reaching out in every direction, hav- 
ing the papacy as its common center. When the Jesuits, 
therefore, bestow their curses upon Luther and other reform- 
ers for having proclaimed the necessity for reform in the 
Church because of the demoralization of the clergy, they 
show their memories to be short in forgetting that their so- 
ciety was justified by its founder upon the plea of the same 
necessity. 

Loyola was fully advised, also, of the progress made by 
the Reformation, and doubtless persuaded himself to believe 
that the necessity for reform would be made available by 
others of less ambition than himself, who would be likely to 
seek for it elsewhere than through the papacy, under whose 
auspices so many evils had grown up, unless he could check 
the progress of the Reformation by the creation of some 
new and opposing influences which he could himself control. 
There were no fundamental points of Christian doctrine in- 
volved ; and, if there had been, the whole life of Loyola 
proves that he would have regarded them of inferior impor- 

3 History of the Society of Jesus. By Daurignac. Vol. I, p. 22. 
* Ibid., -p. 40. 



IGNATIUS LOYOLA. 37 

tance, compared with his main purpose of preventing the 
enlightenment of society by free religious thought, and hold- 
ing it in obedience to authority superior to itself. The 
friendly author already quoted declares his object to have 
been ''to re-establish those principles of submission and dis- 
cipline which alone can insure obedience to legitimate au- 
thority;" 5 that is, to the combined authority of Church and 
State, as no other was at that time considered legitimate by 
him, or has ever been by his society since then. 

The acute and penetrating intellect of Loyola enabled 
him to foresee that, unless some new method of counteract- 
ing the effects of the Reformation should be discovered, the 
disintegration of the Church, already begun, could not be 
arrested. The difficulties surrounding this problem were in- 
creased by the fact that the papacy had been unable to put 
a stop to its own decline; and accordingly he taxed his in- 
ventive faculties, not to reform doctrine — for that was not 
needed beyond the points interpolated upon the primitive 
faith by the ambitious popes — but to prevent the decay of 
papal and ecclesiastical power. Undoubtedly it was his pur- 
pose that whatsoever plan he might adopt should supersede 
the old methods to which the Church had been long accus- 
tomed, and which had the sanction of numerous popes and 
many centuries of time. He intended to enter upon an ex- 
periment, the chief recommendation of which was, that it 
required new paths to be marked out in preference to those 
which had acquired the approval of antiquity. But he was 
careful to see, at every step he took, that whatsoever was 
done should inure to his own credit in the accomplishment 
of such ends as were suggested by the burning ardor and 
ambition of a soldier; in other words, that if good results 
ensued, they should be attributed to himself, and neither to 
the pope, nor to the Church, nor to the ancient monastic or- 
ders. Assuming, as he manifestly did, that all these com- 
bined had failed to check the advancing corruptions of the 



6 History of the Society of Jesus. By Daurignac. Vol. I, p. 40. 



38 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

clergy, which had grown up under their protracted auspices, 
his inventive and ambitious mind was animated by the hope 
of bringing the world to realize that he alone could give to 
the organized authority of Church aud State the vigor and 
efficiency necessary to keep society in obedience. Having a 
mind thoroughly indoctrinated with the principle of absolute 
monarchism, he did not regard it as possible or desirable to 
accomplish this in any other mode than by making that the 
central and controlling feature of whatsoever plan should be 
adopted. Accordingly, in the constitution of the society of 
Jesuits, which was the product of his reflections, he provided 
for consolidating in his own hands, as superior or general, 
such absolute authority as would subject all its members to 
his individual will, so as to hold them, at all times and un- 
der all possible circumstances, in perfect and uninquiring 
obedience, surrendering their right to think as completely as 
if they had never possessed it. By this method he designed 
to annihilate all personal independence, so that freedom of 
thought should not, by any possibility, exist in the society. 
He meant to convert all who were brought within the circle 
of his influence, from thoughtful and reflecting men into 
mere human automatons, and so to mold and fashion them 
that each one should be reduced to a universal and common 
level of humiliating submission and obedience'. Thus he 
hoped to arrest the further development of popular intelli- 
gence, so that those who had been lifted out of the old 
grooves of despotism might be plunged into them again, and 
such as had not should be held there in ignorance and super- 
stition. This he supposed would defeat the Reformation, in 
which event he and his society, as the originator and execu- 
tors of the plan, would enjoy the glory of the achievement. 
If he had ever exhibited any evidences of great sanctity of 
life, this presumption of selfish ambition might have been 
rebutted ; but he was known only as an aspiring soldier, 
whose early life had been characterized by such follies and 
irregularities as prevailed about the courts of royalty at that 



IGNA TIUS LOYOLA. 39 

time. He had done nothing to raise him above the charac- 
ter of an adventurer. 

There was nothing in the original Jesuit constitution 
necessary to Christian faith or to the established doctrines 
of the Roman Church. It provided for the organization of 
a select body of men, united together professedly to main- 
tain what Loyola chose to call the greater glory of God — 
"ad majorem Dei gloriam" — by such undefined methods as 
might be, from time to time, made known to them by their 
general, and without fixing any limitation or restraint upon 
either his discretion or authority. There was no pretense of 
adding to or taking from the settled doctrines or dogmas of 
the Church; for that could have been done only by the 
pope, or by a General Council, or by the two powers acting 
conjointly — in unity. It would have been a direct censure 
of the Church to have assumed the necessity of this, or to 
have solicited authority to undertake it — equivalent to say- 
ing that it had failed to provide the necessary means of 
maintaining the true faith after many centuries of unlimited 
power. It was the duty of Loyola, as a faithful son of the 
Church, no less than it was the duty of those who were less 
pretentious, to have regarded its faith and doctrines as al- 
ready perfect. To have done otherwise would have given 
aid and comfort to Luther and the Reformation. Hence 
his pretense of the necessity for the organization of a new 
society or order, with special methods of its own hitherto 
unknown, clearly indicated a desire to act apart from and 
independently of the existing methods and authorities of the 
Church. 

No matter, however, what pretenses were made by Loy- 
ola, or what his secretly cherished designs were, there is not 
the least ground for doubt that his method of establishing 
and organizing a new society had no relations whatsoever to 
the principles of Christian faith — in other words, that the ex- 
isting methods were competent for all practicable and neces- 
sary purposes without it. It was, consequently, temporal 



40 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

merely; that is, it had reference exclusively to the manage- 
ment of men, so as to reduce them to uninquiring obedience 
to such authority as was set over them. There was nothing 
besides this which the Church and the ancient monastic 
orders did not already possess the power to accomplish. The 
"exercises" he prescribed were, it is true, spiritual in char, 
acter — such as penance and mortification of the flesh — but 
the Church had already provided these, and they were rig- 
idly observed by the monastic orders. The pledge to employ 
them, made by the members of the Jesuit society so as to 
promote their own spiritual welfare, was merely incidental to 
the duty they already owed to the Church. Consequently, 
while these "exercises" conformed to the existing obligations 
imposed by the Church, the new society projected by Loyola 
was intended to furnish the machinery necessary for exacting 
obedience — for training and disciplining all who could be in- 
fluenced by it for that single purpose. And in order to ac- 
complish effectually this obedience to himself and his new 
society, leaving out entirely both the Church and the pope, 
he originally designed that the members of the society should 
be responsible alone to their general, from whom all the 
laws and regulations for their government should emanate. 
The pope, as the head of the Church, had not the least au- 
thority over these members conferred upon him by the orig- 
inal constitution ; nor was it intended that they should obey 
any other authority than that of their general, because he, 
and he alone, was recognized as the sole representative of 
God upon earth. There was nothing spiritual in all this, in 
the sense in which the Church had defined spiritual things 
and the Christian world understood them ; but it made the 
society, as Loyola planned it, temporal merely — a mere police 
corps, drilled and disciplined to obedience alone, without the 
right either to inquire or decide whether the commands of their 
superior were right or wrong. It should surprise no intelli- 
gent man, therefore, at learning the fact that the pope hesi- 
tated about giving the society his approval, when Loyola 
first requested his pontifical ratification of its constitution. 



IGNA TITJS LO YOLA. 41 

That Loyola's original intention was that his new society 
should exact from its members a pledge of fidelity alone to 
himself and those who should succeed him in its govern- 
ment, and not to the Church or to the pope, is plainly to be 
seen in the fact that when he found a few sympathizing 
friends to unite with him, he did not submit the plan of 
organization to the pope for approval, so as to make it a re- 
ligious order like the Dominican, Franciscan, and other an- 
cient orders, but sought only from him permission for him- 
self and friends to go as missionaries to the Holy Land, to 
labor for the conversion of the infidel Turks to Christianity. 
That he then contemplated acting, in so far as the move- 
ments and operations of his society were concerned, inde- 
pendently of the Church and the pope, is evidenced by the 
most undoubted authority. The author of the "Lives of 
the Saints," a work which has the highest indorsement, says: 
"In 1534, on the Feast of the Assumption of our Lady, St. 
Ignatius and his six companions, of whom Francis [Xavier] 
was one, made a vow at Montmartre to visit the Holy Land, 
and unite their labors for the conversion of the infidels ; or, 
if this should be found not practicable, to cast themselves at 
the feet of the pope, and offer their services wherever he 
thought fit to employ them." 6 

It will be seen, therefore, that it was entirely conditional 
whether or no Loyola would make known to the pope his 
new society and the plan of its organization, and ask his 
pontifical approval. He had already formed the primary 
o ionization, and obtained from Xavier and his five other 
associates the necessary vow of obedience, by which they 
had placed themselves entirely under his dominion and con- 
trol. If it should prove " practicable " for him to plant his 
new and independent society in the Holy Land, which pre- 
sented a large and tempting field of operations, it was un- 
doubtedly his secretly-cherished purpose to do so, without 
making his constitution known to the pope, and thus to 

6 Lives of the Saints. By the Kev. Alban Butler. Vol. XII, art- 
icle "St. Francis Xavier," December 3, p. 603. 



42 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

establish in Asia an organization independent of the pope, 
and submissive only to himself. But if found to be "not 
practicable," then, and only then, he and his companions 
would "cast themselves at the feet of the pope, and offer 
their services" to him and to the Church. His military am- 
bition, not yet extinguished, was manifestly kindled afresh 
by the hope that a whole continent would be opened before 
him, where he would find the Oriental methods of obedience 
strictly consistent with those he desired to introduce, and 
where he could create, unmolested, such influences as, being 
introduced into Europe, might counteract those already pro- 
duced by the Reformation. But not until he found that he 
was balked in this, did he intend to devote himself and his 
companions to the immediate work of attempting to arrest 
the progress of the Reformation in Europe, where the exist- 
ing methods of resisting it were not under his control. It 
was worthy of the founder of the Jesuits to solicit the pope's 
approval of this great missionary scheme, and to conceal from 
him, at the same time, his secret purpose to act in the 
name of a new society, adverse to the ancient monastic 
orders and submissive to himself alone. That this conceal- 
ment was studied and premeditated, there can be no reason- 
able doubt ; and as it was the first step taken by Loyola in 
the execution of his plan, he thereby practiced such duplic- 
ity and deceit toward the Church and the pope, that these 
qualities may well be considered as fundamental in the 
society of Jesuits. And there is ample proof in the strange 
and eventful history of this society that it has been, from 
that time till the present, consistently faithful to this example 
of its founder. 

His first successes were, doubtless, flattering to the pride, 
as well as encouraging to the hopes, of Loyola. Having 
succeeded in obtaining the consent of the pope that he and 
his companions should become missionaries to the Holy 
Land, without having revealed the existence or character of 
his society, they were all ordained as priests for that purpose, 
as none of them had been previously admitted to the priest- 



1GNA TlVS LOYOLA. 43 

hood. Thus equipped, they took their departure for Pales- 
tine, with the plan and principles of their organization 
locked up in their own minds, and the ultimate design of 
their ambitious leader known, probably, to himself alone. 
They must have commenced their journey with joyful hearts 
and rapturous hopes, which soon, however, became chilled 
by what Loyola must have considered a sad misfortune, 
probably the first he had encountered since he had received 
the wound at the battle of Pampeluna, which disfigured his 
person so that he could share no longer in the gay festivities 
of the royal court. They were prevented from reaching 
Palestine by the war then in progress between the Emperor 
Charles V and the Turks, and, after an absence of about a 
year, were compelled to return to Europe disheartened, as 
may well be supposed, by their failure. This put a new as- 
pect upon the fortunes of Loyola. His first advance towards 
independence and the acquisition of power had accomplished 
nothing favorable to his ambition, and, consequently, it be- 
came necessary for him to discover some more promising 
field of operations, where no such mishap as he had en- 
countered would be likely to occur again. There was 
abundant room in Europe for missionary labor; but he was 
now, for the first time, confronted by the fact that his 
society could not engage in this work, in the presence of nu- 
merous religious orders already in existence, without obtain- 
ing for it the express approval of the pope, so that, by this 
means, it might be also stamped with a religious character, 
in so far as that approval would confer it. He, manifestly, 
had not calculated upon a crisis which would make it neces- 
sary to submit the provisions of his constitution to the pope, 
or to make them known to any others besides those who 
were to become members of his society, and were willing to 
yield up their manhood so completely as to vow uninquiring 
obedience and submission to him and his successors as the 
only representatives and vicegerents of God upon earth. It 
can not be supposed that a man of so much sagacity as he 
undoubtedly possessed, would not have foreseen the difficulty 



44 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

in obtaining the approval of the pope to a constitution which 
humiliated him by assigning higher authority to the general 
of a new society than the Church had confided to him. But 
he had gone too far to retreat, and had too much courage to 
attempt it; for his courage was never doubted, either upon 
the battle-field or elsewhere ; and when he found it absolutely 
necessary to visit Rome in order to obtain the pope's sanc- 
tion, he did so, accompanied by Lefevre and Laynez, two of 
his companions. Before their departure, however, from 
Vicenza in Austrian Italy, where they were assembled, Loy- 
ola deemed it important to announce to his followers, prob- 
ably for the first time, the name he had decided to give his 
society. He thus instructed them : " To those who ask what 
we are, we will reply, we are the Soldiers of the Holy 
Church, and we form ' Tlie Society of Jesus.' " 7 This was 
evidently suggested by the necessities which then confronted 
him. He had not found it expedient to adopt such a desig- 
nation, or to announce that they were "Soldiers of the Holy 
Church," until their attempt to obtain an independent posi- 
tion in Palestine had failed. Therefore, these avowals, made 
before going to Rome, are justly to be considered as mere ex- 
pedients, suggested by the necessity of obtaining the pope's ap- 
proval. The existing religious orders had taken their names 
from their founders; but Loyola's profane use of the sacred 
name of the Son of God, clearly indicated that he intended to 
set up for his society a claim for holiness superior to all others. 
Or it was assumed as a cover for practices, contemplated by 
him, that would not bear inspection in the light. That it was 
intended as a reflection upon the ancient monastic orders then 
existing, and to express superiority over them, can not be 
doubted. In any view, to say the least, it was impudent 
and presumptuous, and was generally offensive to the Chris- 
tian world. 

At the time of Loyola's visit to Rome, Paul III was 
pope. When his approval of the new society was solicited, 



7 Daurignac. Vol. I, pp. 11-12. 



IGNATIUS LOYOLA. 45 

he deemed it indispensable, as a measure of precaution, that 
the question should be investigated with the greatest care; 
for until then no opportunity had been afforded him of 
knowing the ultimate purposes of Loyola, or the machinery 
he had constructed for executing them. Whether the pope 
suspected him of concealment or not, it is impossible now to 
tell; but that he had reason to do so is evident from the 
most favorable accounts given of the original official inter- 
view between them. Then it was that the pope was ap- 
prised, for the first time, that the constitution under which 
the society of Jesuits had been organized, required a solemn 
vow, by which all the members were pledged to "implicit 
and unquestioning obedience to their superior," 8 without the 
possibility of equivocation or mental reservation ; that is, to 
Loyola himself as the first general, and to his successors 
from time to time thereafter. It required but little delibera- 
tion upon the part of the pope to realize that neither the 
Church nor the papacy could derive any advantage from 
this, but rather injury; for the reason that it would create a 
society under the protection of both, and, at the same time, 
absolutely independent of both. He therefore hesitated, evi- 
dently supposing that his approval under those circumstances 
would drag him into deep waters from which it would not 
be easy to escape, and referred the question to a committee 
of cardinals for thorough and scrutinizing investigation, so 
that his final action should be based upon full information. 
Loyola was too sagacious not to have anticipated this 
difficulty ; but he manifestly hoped to escape it in some way, 
either by evading or bridging it over, or he would not have 
asked the pope to approve the original constitution which 
contained it. He certainly did not desire or contemplate 
any change in his original constitution or plan ; and there- 
fore, when Paul III hesitated and appointed a committee of 
cardinals to scrutinize them, he must have felt a degree of 
perplexity to which his proud and ambitious military spirit 



8 History of the Jesuits. By Nicolini. Page 27. 



46 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

had not been hitherto accustomed to submit unresistingly. 
He could not avoid seeing, however, that if the pope's final 
decision should be adverse to him, it would necessarily be 
the death of his society, upon which he had, with inordinate 
ambition, fixed his hopes. The occasion constituted the 
most serious crisis in his personal fortunes he had ever en- 
countered. Success promised him a long list of triumphs; 
defeat, nothing but obscurity. He had no such intellectual 
resources as fitted him for rencounter with those who had, 
not having attended school until after he had reached the 
years of manhood, and not having then shown any special 
aptness for learning. Whatsoever capacity he possessed, 
tended in the direction of governing men, his faculty for 
which was developed during his service in the army; and 
he must therefore have experienced the consciousness that if 
he failed to obtain the sanction of the pope, his career would 
be seriously, if not entirely, checked. The future of the papacy 
depended upon the successful training of men to obedience; 
and Loyola, understanding this, could have had no difficulty 
in persuading the pope that a society like his, contrived es- 
pecially to suspend the power of human reasoning and re- 
duce its members to mere unthinking machines, would more 
assuredly produce that result than had been done by the 
very worst forms of absolute despotism which had, for so 
many centuries, held the Oriental world in subjugation. 

But Loyola's embarrassment did not amount to discom- 
fiture. He may never have held personal intercourse with 
Paul III before; but he understood th^ papacy, its wants 
and necessities, and had ample opportunity to study the char- 
acter and penetrate the motives of the pope. For this he 
was specially fitted — few men have lived who excelled him 
in this respect — and, having constructed his society upon the 
theory that men were of no value unless persuaded to sur- 
render up their personality to superiors, the occasion served 
him to address such arguments to the pope as would con- 
vince him that the obedience to authority he had introduced 
in his society was just what the existing exigencies of the 



IGNA TIUS LOYOLA. 47 

papacy required to save it from overthrow. It may easily 
be seen now — although the pope may not have then em- 
ployed penetration enough to discover it — that he did not 
intend to deal unequivocally and in entire frankness with 
the pope, so long as there remained a prospect of obtaining 
his end otherwise. He evidently had an accurate concep- 
tion of what is meant by the terms confession and avoid- 
ance, in the sense of seeming to consent while not consent- 
ing. Thus, in order to remove the objection of the pope 
and secure his approval, he suggested another and new obli- 
gation to be inserted in the constitution of his society, pro- 
viding that the members should also take a vow "of obedi- 
ence to the Holy See and to the pope pro tempore, with the 
express obligation of going, without remuneration, to what- 
soever part of the world it shall please the pope to send 
them." 9 These words must be read critically in order that 
their meaning as intended by Loyola, and always since in- 
terpreted by the Jesuits, may not be misconceived. Their 
true import is, that whilst the members of the society were 
to pay obedience to the pope as well as to their general, it 
was qualified as to the former, and absolute as to the latter; 
that is, that as they were nominally to have two heads, the 
authority of both should, for all practical purposes, center 
in one. In point of fact, as amply demonstrated by subse- 
quent experience, this new provision did not change the 
nature or limit the extent of the obligation of unquestioning 
obedience to the Jesuit general. Its most essential feature 
was that which required the members to go wheresoever or- 
dered by the pope, without compensation; but with regard 
to this and all other duties, and the manner of discharging 
them, they were required to obey their general. They could 
receive no instructions except those which came from him, 
all of which they were required to obey as coming directly 
from God. This amendment created no special relations — 
or, indeed, any whatsoever — between the pope and the 



9 History of the Jesuits. By Nicolini. Page 27. 



48 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

society; for he held no direct intercourse with it. And it 
only created such relations between the pope and the general 
as obliged the latter to send the members wheresoever the 
former desired, without remuneration. They remained the 
slaves of the general, and not the slaves of the pope. They 
obeyed the general, and not the pope, unless ordered to do 
so by the general, in which case they paid obedience only to 
the latter. But Paul III did not detect the well-concealed 
purposes of Loyola, and may not even have suspected them, 
in view of his anxiety to arrest the disintegration of the 
Church and the threatened decay *of the papacy. Howso- 
ever this may have been, the cunningly-contrived concession 
made to him by Loyola was satisfactory to him, notwith- 
standing the opposition of one of the committee of cardinals, 
and he issued his pontifical bull approving the society of 
Jesuits as a religious order. This pledge of fidelity to the 
pope, however, has been kept or evaded accordingly as the 
interests of the society have from time to time demanded. 
Its history shows promicent instances when the decisions of 
the popes have been denounced and resisted, and when the 
popes themselves have been treated with contempt and defi- 
ance. When the Jesuits have found shelter and protection 
under the authority of the popes, they have exalted them to 
absolute equality with God; when otherwise, they have dis- 
obeyed and traduced them. 



CHAPTER III. 

THE CONSTITUTION OF THE SOCIETY. 

All the circumstances which attended the origin and 
establishment of the society of Jesuits combine to explain, 
with unmistakable clearness, the motives which must have 
influenced the mind and incited the action of Loyola in 
every step he took. They plainly show that his leading and 
controlling purpose was to organize a body of men, each one of 
whom should be brought into implicit and unquestioning obe- 
dience to the authority of their general, and hold themselves 
in readiness so long as the society existed, to do, without the 
least inquiry into results, whatsoever he should command to 
be done, so that they should have no wills or opinions of 
their own upon any subject over which he should assert juris- 
diction. By making this the central and most fundamental 
principle of the constitution, he placed his society in direct 
antagonism to all intellectual progress and enlightenment — to 
everything that tended to dignify and elevate mankind. No 
one, therefore, ought to wonder that it has produced more 
disturbance in the world than any other organization that 
has ever existed ; or, if it were out of the way, could ever 
exist again. 

The constitution was locked up in the secret archives of 
the society for more than two hundred years, many of its 
details having been unknown, it is said, even by a consider- 
able portion of the members, whose submissive obedience 
must have reduced them to the condition of trained animals. 
This concealment by a society professedly religious could 
not have been favorable to Christianity, and must have been 
the consequence of some sinister motive, as subsequent de- 
velopments have shown. This is a fair inference from the 
reluctance with which the constitution was surrendered 
when the French Government demanded its exposure. The 

49 



50 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

facts connected with the proceedings of the French Parlia- 
ment, when they compelled the society to make it known, 
justify the belief that there must have been some special 
reason for its long concealment, aud that the public odium, 
so long resting upon it in France, was attributable, among 
other things, to the secrecy of its proceedings. And when it 
is considered that the strong and vigorous measures adopted 
by the Parliament to extort the constitution by dragging it 
from its hiding-place, transpired at a time when Protestant- 
ism had no control whatsoever over the public affairs of 
France, it conclusively proves that the integrity of the 
society was suspected by the French people whilst they were 
faithful adherents of the Roman Church. Such a fact as 
this indicates — what every Jesuit stands ready to deny if 
necessary — that where the society was best known, it was 
most suspected and disliked. 

The whole machinery of this society was admirably de- 
signed to accomplish its complete consolidation. Although 
Loyola was neither a theologian nor a learned man, having 
obtained almost his entire education after he was thirty years 
of age, yet he understood, far better than many who had ac- 
quired higher intellectual culture, the springs and motives of 
human conduct; and this, supplemented by cunning, which 
never deserted him, constituted his leading characteristic. 
As his sole object was to dominate over others by promising 
them a place in paradise as a reward for unmanning them- 
selves, he studiously excluded all who could not be reduced 
to this low condition by training, discipline, and education. 
Accordingly, before an applicant could be admitted to pro- 
bation, his whole life and character were closely scrutinized 
by the general, if it were in his power to do so; but if not, 
by persons selected as spies, who were " to live with him and 
examine him," so as to be able to penetrate his most secret 
thoughts. 1 Upon admission, he was required to confess to a 
rector, who was to be recognized by him as holding " the 

1 Constitution. Part I, chap, i, \ 3. Apud Mcolini : History of 
the Jesuits, p. 32. 



THE CONSTITUTION OF THE SOCIETY. 51 

place of Christ our Lord," and from whom nothing should be 
concealed — "not opposing, not contradicting, nor showing an 
opinion in any case opposed to his opinion." 2 When the 
probationer was found by these tests qualified for member- 
ship — that is, when it was ascertained that he had no will of 
his own, but was fitted by nature and inclination for a state 
of complete bondage — he was required to recognize the gen- 
eral of the society as occupying the place of God, and as pos- 
sessing absolute authority over him, with the right to exact 
absolute obedience from him. He was reduced to the condi- 
tion of a mere inanimate machine, with no discretionary power 
whatsoever over his own emotions, opinions, or actions. This 
obligation is thus expressed in the constitution : "He must 
regard the superior as Christ the Lord, and must strive to 
acquire perfect resignation and denial of his own will and 
judgment, in all things conforming his will and judgment to 
that which the superior wills and judges." 3 And, in order to 
assure, beyond the possibility of mistake, the complete sur- 
render of all individuality, and to bring the probationer 
down to the lowest possible degradation, his uninquiring obe- 
dience is defined and exacted in these words: " As for holy 
obedience, this virtue must be perfect in every point — in ex- 
ecution, in will, in intellect — doing what is enjoined with all 
celerity, spiritual joy, and perseverance ; persuading our- 
selves that everything is just; suppressing every repugnant 
thought and judgment of one's own, in a certain obedi- 
ence; . . . and let every one persuade himself that he 
who lives under obedience should be moved and directed, 
under Divine Providence, by his superior, just as if he were 
a corpse (perinde ac si cadaver essei), which allows itself to 
be moved and led in any direction." * 

It would be hard to find, in any written or spoken Ian 
guage, words more expressive than these of the . complete 

2 Constitution. Part IV, chap, x, § 5. Apud Nicolini : History oi 
trie Jesuits, p. 33. 

3 Const. Part III, chap, i, \ 23. Ibid. 
* Const. Part VI, chap, i, \ 1. Ibid. 



52 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

eradication of all sense of personality, unless it be some else- 
where employed in the same society to express the same 
or equivalent ideas. In the Prague edition of the " Insti- 
tutes," the following is given as the lauguage of one of its 
decrees: "It behooves our brethren to be pre-eminent in 
true and absolute obedience, in abnegation of all individ- 
ual will and judgment." 5 The Jesuit Bartoli, in his history 
of Loyola, expresses the meaning of the constitution in sub- 
stantially the same words, thus: "An entire abnegation of 
their own will, of their own judgment." 6 Elsewhere he says the 
members must act " according to the pleasure of the supe- 
rior." 7 Again: "What can be more complete than our sub- 
mission to the orders of our superiors in everything that 
concerns our state of life, the places we are to dwell in, the 
employments, the offices we are to be engaged in." 8 And 
again, this submission to the will and judgment of the supe- 
rior, or general, is called "renouncing our own judgment," 
"the annihilation of self," "complete obedience, entire de- 
pendence upon the will of others, perfect abandonment of per- 
sonal reputation." 9 

This self-abnegation, this slavery of the mind, is a worse 
form of servitude than the slavery of the body. The latter 
places fetters upon the limbs, the former rivets shackles 
upon the mind. A brief comparison will illustrate this. 
The methods of punishing slaves for disobedience have va- 
ried accordingly as masters have been humane or otherwise. 
Some have been compelled to endure the torture of solitary 
imprisonment and starvation ; others to wear iron fetters until 
they have eaten, by slow degrees, into their flesh ; and multi- 
tudes have escaped only with the lash. In all this, merely the 
animal capacity for enduring physical suffering has been put 
to the test, — the minds of the victims having been left free 
to implore the mercy and protection of Providence, according 

6 The Jesuits, their Constitution and Teaching. By Cartwright. 
Page 15, note * 

6 History of St. Ignatius Loyola. By Bartoli. Vol. II, p. 46. 
» Ibid. , p. 47. 8 Ibid., p. 49. 9 Ibid., p. 51. 



THE CONSTITUTION OF THE SOCIETY. 53 

to their own wills and consciences. But this Jesuit method 
of training probationers and novices to secure their implicit 
obedience to their superiors, transcends anything pertaining, 
especially in modern times, to the relation of master and 
slaves. It trifles with the interests and destiny of the soul, 
its relations to God and to eternity, by substituting a mere 
man, with the passions and impulses of other men, as the 
final arbiter of human conduct, and with the power to open 
and close the doors of heaven at his own personal pleasure. 
It is for fitting him to assent implicitly to this that the 
Jesuit is required to abnegate his individual self, dismiss 
from his mind the idea that God gave him the priceless 
faculty of thought and reflection, and abase himself to such 
a degree that he has no will or judgment of his own concern- 
ing the future condition of his soul. By considering himself 
a mere corpse — dead to everything in life but humiliating 
obedience to the general — he consents to accept his com- 
mands as equal to those of God, and to recognize the sen- 
tence he might see fit to pass upon him in this life, in lieu of 
the judgment of God in the life to come. 

There is a vast deal of cumulative evidence upon these 
points, which have evidently been considered fundamental 
and indispensable. Besides the foregoing humiliating vows, 
strict rules and regulations are established for the govern- 
ment of the novices. Number 34 is as follows: "At the 
voice of the superior, just as if it came from Christ the Lord, 
we must be most ready, leaving everything whatsoever, even 
a letter of the alphabet, unfinished, though begun." Rule 35 
defines " holy obedience" to be " abnegating all opinion and 
judgment of our own contrary thereto [that is, to what they 
are commanded to do], with a certain blind obedience." 
Rule 36 is in these words: "Let every member persuade 
himself that those who wish to live under obedience, ought 
to suffer themselves to be borne along and governed through 
Divine Providence through the superiors, just as if they were 
a corpse, which may be borne as we please, and permits itself 
to be handled anyhow; or like an old man's stick, which 



54 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

everywhere serves any purpose that he who holds it chooses 
to employ it in." 10 The same ideas exactly are expressed 
in one of the vows which Loyola made conspicuous, and 
which is given by Bartoli in his biography, as follows: "I 
should regard myself as a dead body, without will or intelli- 
gence, as a little crucifix which is turned about unresistingly 
at the will of him who holds it, as a staff in the hands of an 
old man, who uses it as he requires it, and as it suits him 
best." 11 

The human mind is not fertile enough in invention to dis- 
cover a lower depth of humiliation than this — a more complete 
surrender of all the ennobling qualities and instincts of man- 
hood. If these have ever been possessed, the remembrance 
of them is required to be obliterated, so that there may be 
no room in the mind for a single generous emotion. When 
Shakespeare conceived the idea of a "mindless slave," he 
must have had before his mind the portrait of a Jesuit, after 
he had been disciplined and fashioned under the master- 
hand of Loyola, who left his followers no personal sense of 
truth or right or justice, having made their abnegation so 
thorough that, even with the knowledge of right and wrong, 
truth and falsehood, they were trained to incline indifferently 
to either as commanded by their superiors. He allowed no 
hesitation, heard no reasons, accepted neither apology nor 
excuse. Their whole duty consisted in blind and uninquir- 
ing obedience to him in thought, word, and deed, no matter 
what consequences might follow, or what harm be inflicted. 
What of consciences they had left, were required to become 
so callous as to be insensible to either honor or shame, all 
conscientious sense being extinguished as if it had never ex- 
isted — like the light of a candle blown out. Nowhere else 
in the world, within the confines of civilization, has such a 
point of the absolute annihilation of individuality been 
reached. Nowhere else is a man required to acknowledge 
himself a "corpse," a "dead body," a "little crucifix," a 

10 History of the Jesuits. By Steinmetz. Vol. I, p. 251, N. 1. 
"Bartoli. Vol. II, p. 93. 



THE CONSTITUTION OF THE SOCIETY. 55 

."staff" in the hands of another, with no will, or thought, 
or sensibility, or emotion, except such as shall be dictated by 
those to whose mastery he has ignominiously submitted. It 
is the very perfection of tyranny, such as the most heartle9S 
despots known to history would have rejoiced to discover. 

Far too little consideration is generally given, even by 
careful students of history, to this assumption of equality 
with Christ — this vain pretense of a state of divine perfec- 
tion which recognizes a single human being as possessing 
upon earth the authority of God. Undoubtedly it is true 
that multitudes of individuals, of good intentions, have been 
misled by it into the false belief that the most prominent 
feature in the pirn of Christ's atonement was the substitu- 
tion for himself of a mere man, to whom alone, of all man- 
kind, he assigned his own divine attributes. The original 
suggestion of such a proposition must have startled the Chris- 
tian mind; and its establishment as an article of faith may 
be intelligently accounted for by the fact that the supersti- 
tion and ignorance of the Middle Ages enabled monarchism 
in Church aud State to perpetuate itself by requiring this 
dogma to be accepted as revealed by Christ himself. In 
evidence of its repugnance to the common sense of man- 
kind, it is proper to observe that the Christian world has 
ever since labored hard to get rid of the delusion, and would 
in all probability long since have done so, but for the society 
of Jesuits, which has ceaselessly maintained it as an essen- 
tial part of its machinery. That it is condemned and re- 
pudiated by reason, it requires no argument to prove in this 
enlightened age. If the Creator had designed that he should 
have such a representative upon earth after the ascension of 
Christ, he would have imparted his divine attributes to him 
by such manifestations of his own power as the world could 
not misunderstand — either by such simple and peaceful inci- 
dents as attested the birth and divinity of the Savior, or by 
such convulsions of nature as accompanied the delivery of 
the tables of the law to Moses. In the entire absence of any 
visible and intelligent evidences whatsoever of this divine 



56 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

purpose, the pretension of it, as the mere means of acquiring 
authority over others and exacting obedience from them, is 
nothing less than presumptuous and vainglorious impiety. 
It seeks to dethrone God by abolishing the bar of judgment, 
where he has announced that all mankind shall appear; for 
what is it less than this to say that conformity to the com- 
mands of the Jesuit general assures, beyond any perad ven- 
ture, admission to the kingdom of heaven? God manifestly 
reserved to himself this great prerogative; and he who 
claims it as pertaining to an earthly office of man's creation, 
arraigns the divine authority, and insults the Majesty of 
heaven by requiring that the Creator shall abdicate his 
throne. If, moreover, God had intended to confer divine 
attributes upon any individual man, it is contrary to a just 
estimate of his character, as well as to all human experi- 
ence, to suppose he would have chosen the general of a so- 
ciety which has from its origin been a byword of reproach 
among the nations, upon which such a heavy weight of 
odium has rested that it has been ignominiously driven out 
of every nation in Europe; whose enormities compelled a 
good and virtuous pope to suppress and abolish it in order 
to assure the peace and welfare of the Church; and whose 
members are still skulking through these same nations, si- 
lently and secretly, as ghostly apparitions are supposed to 
move about in the night-time' under the cover of darkness. 

But the Jesuit constitution goes to even a greater extent 
of impiety. After a novitiate has, by the foregoing methods, 
been converted into an unthinking and unresisting piece of 
machinery, like a block of wood or marble carved by the 
hand of an artist, his course of future servility is so opened 
before him that he may fully understand how he shall give 
proof of fidelity to his vows, by doing whatsoever the gen- 
eral shall command, or by omitting to do whatsoever he shall 
forbid. Here the thoughtful reader to whom these revela- 
tions are new, no matter what form of religious faith he may 
profess, will be likely to pause in astonishment at the delib- 
erately-avowed purpose to disregard the laws of States, of 



THE CONSTITUTION OF THE SOCIETY. 57 

social morality, and even of God, when the general shall 
command either of these things to be done. The following 
are the words of the constitution, as given by Nicolini: 

"No constitution, declaration, or any order of living, can 
involve an obligation to commit sin, mortal or venial, unless 
the superior command it in the name of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, or in virtue of holy obedience, which shall be done 
in those cases or persons wherein it shall be judged that it 
will greatly conduce to the particular good of each, or to the 
general advantage; and, instead of the fear of offense, let 
the love and desire of all perfection proceed, that the greater 
glory and praise of Christ, our Creator and Lord, may 
follow." 12 

This language should be re-read and carefully scanned; 
for, at a single glance, it seems to have been written so as to 
furnish ground for equivocation, a practice in which the 
Jesuits, by long use, have acquired consummate skill. It 
may be easily interpreted, however, in the light of what 
Bartoli says. According to him, the novice is required to 
place himself "entirely in the hands of God, and of him 
who holds the place of God by his authority," which, of 
course, is the general or superior. After setting forth that 
the novitiate is required to take this vow, "In everything 
which is not sinful, I must do the will of my superior and 
not my own," he enlarges upon the obligations of the same 
vow with the following particularity: "If it seems to me 
that the superior has ordered me to do something against my 
conscience, or in which there appears to be something sinful, 
if he is of a contrary opinion, and I have no certainty, I 
should rely upon him. If my trouble continues, I should 
lay aside my own judgment, and confide my doubts to one, 
two, or three persons, and rely upon their decision. If all 
this shall not satisfy me, I am far from the perfection which 
my religious state requires. I must no longer belong to my- 
self, but to my Creator, and to those who govern in his 



12 Constitution. Part VI, chap, v, \ 31. Apud Mcolini, p. 34. 



58 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

name, and in whose hands I should be as soft wax, whatso- 
ever he chooses to require of me." 13 Another vow, also 
given by Bartoli, shows that this same obedience is due as 
well to a vicious and immoral as to a virtuous superior; that 
is, that by the religion which the Jesuits profess, it makes 
no difference, in so far as the obligation of obedience to his 
interpretation of the laws of God and morality is concerned, 
whether he be wise or unwise, saint or sinner. It says: 
"To believe that a thing ought to be because the superior 
orders it, is the last and most perfect degree. We can not 
arrive at this degree without recognizing in the person of 
our superior, be he wise or imprudent, holy or imperfect, the 
authority of Jesus Christ himself, whom he represents." 14 
And another vow, illustrating the character of this obedi- 
ence, is thus given: "With regard to property, I must de- 
pend upon the superior alone, consider nothing as my per- 
sonal property, and myself, in all that I am, as a statue, 
which allows itself to be stripped, no matter what the occa- 
sion may be, and offers no resistance." 15 

It requires but ordinary sagacity to interpret all this; its 
meaning is too plain to mislead. The constitution, according 
to Nicolini, prohibits the commission of sin — not absolutely, 
but conditionally; that is, "unless the superior command it 
in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ;" which imports, as 
even an uninstructed mind may see, that there are occasions 
when the sanction of Christ may be invoked to justify the 
commission of sin; or, in other words, when the general of 
the Jesuits, by virtue of his representing God upon earth, 
may, at his own personal will, convert vice into virtue ! The 
Jesuit is not permitted to do anything on his own account, 
or upon his own judgment, that would amount to sin; but 
must do, upon the command of the general, what he, in his 
own conscience, believes to be sin ; because, as the general 
stands in the place of God, he is bound to accept it as not 
sin. The word " unless," as employed in the constitution, is 



is Bartoli, Vol. II, pp. 92, 93. " Ibid. , p. 95, » Ibid. , p.94. 



THE CONSTITUTION OF TEE SOCIETY 59 

a simple negation, which makes the plain meaning of the 
sentence this, that if the general does not command the 
members of the society to commit sin, they are not permitted 
to do of themselves what he considers to be sin ; but if he 
does so command, in the name of Christ, then they may sin 
without fear of consequences, either in this world or in the 
world to come. Every instructed Christian mind, no matter 
what its form of faith, must consider this blasphemous, be- 
cause it assumes that the general may successfully exercise 
the divine authority of Christ to authorize sin to be commit- 
ted, or to condone and pardon it after commission. This 
assumption goes to the full extent of deciding what is and 
what is not sin, by considering it alone with reference "to 
the particular good of each" member of the society, or to its 
"general advantage," and not to the law of God. Whatso- 
ever either of these shall require, if commanded by the gen- 
eral, "shall be done," if the command shall be given "in the 
name of our Lord Jesus Christ !" Nothing can be allowed 
to stand in the way of this. " No constitution, declaration, 
or any order of living" — not even the law of God — can be 
set up against the general! He occupies the place of God, 
and must be obeyed, howsoever the peace and welfare of the 
multitude may be imperiled, or the nations be convulsed from 
center to circumference. The society of Jesuits must obtain 
the mastery, even if general anarchy shall prevail, or all the 
world besides be covered with the fragments of a universal 
wreck ! 

There should be no mistake at this point, for the doctrine 
involved is vital to the Jesuits. Their society could no more 
exist without it than could a watch keep time after the re- 
moval of its mainspring. Although, unlike Nicolini, Bar- 
toli does not give the precise words of the constitution, this 
important vow, as set forth by him in his life of Loyola, has 
substantially the same meaning. According to him, its im- 
port is plainly this, that the general, whether "wise or im- 
prudent, holy or imperfect," stands in "the place of God;" 
that, whilst in the abstract it is sinful to commit sin, when 



60 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the act is performed upon individual judgment, yet, if the 
geDeral shall order it, and the conscience of the Jesuit rebel 
against it because he considers it sin, he shall "rely" upon 
the general, and not upon himself; that is, he shall so close 
his mind that no conscientious convictions shall penetrate it. 
And until he has reached this condition of stupid and servile 
obedience, he is "far from the perfection which his religious 
state requires." And, to reduce the matter to the plainest 
and simplest proposition, the Jesuit is bound "to believe that 
a thing ought to be, because the superior orders it ;" so that, 
if he shall order sin to be committed, the Jesuit is required 
not to consider it as sin because God, through the general, 
commands it! This is precisely as if it were said that sin 
may be justifiably committed in God's name, whensoever it 
shall be required by " the particular good of each," or by the 
"general advantage" of the society. It requires, of course, 
no argument to show that this authority of the general is 
considered comprehensive enough to justify resistance or 
covert opposition to the constitution and laws of any State, 
or the violation of any treaty, contract, or oath, which shall 
stand in the way of the society in its struggle after universal 
dominion. 

Here we have information from two sources with refer- 
ence to Jesuit doctrine upon a point of the very chiefest im- 
portance. Nicolini was a native Italian, and resided at 
Rome, where he undoubtedly had access to the best and most 
reliable sources of information. Bartoli was a Jesuit, and 
must have been familiar with the principles and teachings of 
the society, or he would not have been trusted and patronized 
by it as the biographer of Loyola. They do not disagree 
materially with regard to the general principle which forbids 
sin in an abstract form and upon individual responsibility, 
but justifies its commission when ordered by the general of 
the Jesuits. It is, therefore, obviously deducible from this 
general principle, as stated by both of them, that when the 
general shall require the perpetration of any crime, or the 
violation of any obligation, or oath, or constitution, or law, 



THE CONSTITUTION OF THE SOCIETY. 61 

or the performance of any act howsoever perfidious or 
shameless, — in all, or any of these cases, the Jesuit shall exe- 
cute his commands without "fear of offense." The general 
is thus placed above all governments, constitutions, and laws, 
and even above God himself! There are no laws of a State, 
no rules of morality established by society, no principles of 
religious faith established by any Church — including even 
the Koman Church itself — that the Jesuit is not bound to 
resist, when commanded by his general to do so, no matter 
if it shall lead to war, revolution, or bloodshed, or to the up- 
heaval of society from its very foundations. Everything is 
centered in the good of the society, and to that all else must 
defer. No wonder that the Jesuit casuists have found in this 
provision of their constitution the source of that odious and 
demoralizing maxim that " the means are justified by the 
end ;" in other words, if, in the judgment of the general, the 
end is considered right, howsoever criminal or sinful, it be- 
comes sanctified, and may be accomplished without " the fear 
of offense." 

Nor is this all. After, as Nicolini says, " having thus 
transferred the allegiance of the Jesuit from his God to his 
general, the constitution proceeds to secure that allegiance 
from all conflict with the natural affections or worldly inter- 
ests." 16 It does not allow anything — any affections of the 
heart or earthly interests of any kind or nature whatsoever — 
to intervene between the Jesuit and his superior. If he has 
family ties, he must break them ; if friends, he must discard 
them ; if property, he must surrender it to the superior, and 
take the vow of absolute and extreme poverty ; he must, in 
fact, render himself insensible to every sentiment, or emo- 
tion, or feeling that could, by possibility, exist from instinct 
or habits of thought in his own mind. As it regards prop- 
erty, the constitution provides that "he will accomplish a 
work of great perfection if he dispose of it in benefit of the 
society." And continuing this subject, with reference to pa- 



16 Nicolini, p 34. 



62 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

ternal affections, it continues: ''And that his better example 
may shine before men, he must put away all strong affection 
for his parents, and refrain from the unsuitable desire of a 
bountiful distribution arising from such disadvantageous af- 
fection." 17 He shall not communicate with any person by 
letter without its inspection by the superior, who shall read 
all letters addressed to him before their delivery ; of course, 
permitting only such to be sent by or to reach him as shall 
be approved. " He shall not leave the house except at such 
times and with such companions as the superior shall allow; 
nor within the house shall he converse, without restraint, 
with any one at his own pleasure, but with such only as shall 
be appointed by the superior." 18 He shall not be allowed to 
go out of the house unless accompanied by two of the breth- 
ren as spies upon his conduct, and the neglect of either to 
report faithfully what the others have done and said is held 
to be sinful. And to make sure that all the members reflect 
only the opinions dictated by him, they are bound to abso- 
lute uniformity, as follows: "Let all think, let all speak, 
as far as possible, the same thing, according to the apostle. 
Let no contradictory doctrines, therefore, be allowed, either 
by word of mouth, or public sermons, or in written books, 
which last shall not be published without the approbation 
and consent of the general ; and, indeed, all differences of 
opinion regarding practical matters shall be avoided." 19 
Commenting upon these things, Nicolini most appropriately 
says: "Thus no one but the general can exercise the right 
of uttering a single original thought or opinion. It is almost 
impossible to conceive the power, especially in former times, 
of a general having at his absolute disposal such an amount 
of intelligences, wills, and energies." 20 



17 Constitution. Part III, chap, i, $ 7-9. Apud Nicolini, pp. 34, 35. 

18 Const. Part III, chap, i, § 2, 3. Apud Nicolini, p. 36. 

19 Const. Part III, chap, i, § 18. Apud Nicolini, p. 36. These 
general matters are also treated of by Bartoli, Vol. II, chaps, iv and 
v, pp. from 33-78. 

20 Nicolini, p. 36. 



THE CONSTITUTION OF THE SOCIETY. 63 

If there were any evidences to prove that the Jesuits, as 
a society, have abandoned any of the principles or policy 
which bear the stamp of Loyola's approval, there would be 
no necessity, other than that which incites to historic investi- 
gation, for a careful and critical investigation of them. But 
there are none. On the contrary, it will be seen that, from 
their very nature, they are not susceptible of change so long 
as the society shall exist. The memory of Loyola is still 
preserved with intense devotion. He is worshiped as a saint, 
and the words uttered by him are as much reverenced as 
those spoken by the Savior. It seems impossible, therefore, 
to escape the conviction that this extraordinary society is un- 
like any other now existing, or which has heretofore existed, 
in the world. That it was conceived by the active brain of 
an ambitious and worldly-minded enthusiast, who had been 
disappointed at not winning the military distinction he had 
expected, is an irresistible inference from facts well estab- 
lished in his personal history. His vanity and imperiousuess 
suggested the starting-point of his organization, whereby man 
was treated as incapable of intelligent reflection — fit only to 
become the unresisting tool of those who venture profauely 
to affirm, contrary to any divine revelation, that God has 
endowed them alone with authority to subject the world to 
obedience. His plan of operations was, from the beginning, 
a direct censure of all the ancient religious orders, as it was 
also of the methods the Church had adopted after the expe- 
rience of many centuries. When he conceived it, his chief 
purpose undoubtedly was, as heretofore explained, 21 to make 
himself and his successors independent of and superior to 
the pope and the Church. His contemplated antagonism to 
both was sufficiently indicated by the fact that his original 
constitution centered absolute and irresponsible power in the 
hands of the general of his society; and the subsequent in- 
troduction of the simulated vow of qualified fidelity to the 
pope — which was brought about by a degree of necessity 



21 Ante, chap, ii, p. 4L 



64 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

amounting almost to duress — has had no other effect than to 
tax the strategic ingenuity of more than one general by the 
invention of subterfuges to evade it. In furtherance of this 
idea, the society holds no intercourse with the pope, nor he 
with it. Its members are all independent of him. They are 
the creatures and instruments of the general alone. They 
obey him, and no other. If he, as the head of the society, 
does not think proper to execute the orders of the pope — as 
has often occurred — the question is alone between the pope 
and him, not with the society. The only point of unity is 
between the general and the members ; and of this the so- 
ciety boasts with its habitual vanity. In enumerating the 
methods by which its duration is considered assured, Bartoli 
says: "The chief is a strict union between the members 
and the head, consequent upon entire dependence, which re- 
sults from perfect obedience. Ignatius established a mon- 
archical form of government in the society, and placed the 
whole administration of the order in the hands of the gen- 
eral, with an authority absolute and independent of all men, 
with the sole exception of the sovereign pontiff. The gen- 
eral then decided absolutely, both in the choice of the supe- 
riors, as well as in everything which concerns the members of 
the company." 22 This sufficiently shows that the pope deals 
alone with the general, and he alone with the society ; except 
through the latter, the former can not reach the members, or 
communicate his will to them ; and even when the pope com- 
municates with the general, the whole obligation of the lat- 
ter's obedience consists in sending the members of the society 
to whatsoever part of the world the pope shall direct without 
remuneration. And it is by these means that the society 
constitutes what Bartoli calls "one solid and durable whole," 
nominally with two heads, but practically paying obedience 
to but one. 

It was scarcely necessary to say that the society existed 
under "a monarchical form of government," for it is im- 
possible for such an organization to exist in any other form. 

22 Bartoli, Vol. II, p. 88. 



THE CONSTITUTION OF THE SOCIETY. 65 

In fact, it surpasses in that respect any institution ever 
known, not excepting the most tyrannical despotisms by 
which the Oriental peoples were held in bondage for cen- 
turies. Until the time of Loyola no man ever conceived — 
or if he did, the avowal of it is unknown to history — the 
idea that the plain and simple teachings of Christ, which are 
easily interpreted, could be distorted into an apology for re- 
ducing mankind to a multitude of unthinking corpses or 
dead bodies, without thoughts, opinions, or motives of their 
own, so that they should submit implicitly to the dictation 
of a single man, who, to prepare them for perfect obedience, 
required that the best affections of their hearts should be ex- 
tinguished, and nothing generous or kindly or noble be per- 
mitted to exist in them. Absolutism could not possibly be 
carried further, for there is no degree of humiliation lower 
than that the Jesuit is required to reach. Howsoever culti- 
vated in art, or learned in letters, or courtly in manners, or 
fascinating in oratory he may become, his conscience is 
dwarfed into cowardice, and he has parted with his manhood 
as if it were an old garment to be cast aside at pleasure. 
No picture of him could be more true than that drawn by 
the friendly pen of Bartoli, who tells us, boastingly, that 
"the society requires no members who are governed by hu- 
man respect." 23 It requires, according to this biographer of 
Loyola, only those who hold in utter contempt the opinions 
of the world, those who extinguish in their minds all sense 
of either praise or shame, and who close all avenues by 
which men's hearts are reached by noble or generous or 
patriotic impulses. They seem to think that God, after 
making man "in his own image" and with capacity for in- 
spiring thoughts, paralyzed his best affections in mere sport, 
and left him only fitted for blind obedience to an imperious 
master, who requires him to sunder all the tenderest domestic 
relations as if they invited to impiety, and who treats all the 
highest social virtues as vices when they do not advance his 
ambitious ends, and any form of vice as virtue when it does. 
23 Bartoli, Vol. II, p. 85. 



CHAPTER IV. 

GOVERNMENT OF THE SOCIETY. 

Any reader of the last two chapters can see — without the 
admission of Bartoli to that effect — that the government of 
the society of Jesuits is entirely monarchical, and founded 
upon the paternalism set up by imperial rulers in proof of 
their divine right to govern. Like these rulers, Loyola 
maintained that mankind were not competent to govern 
themselves, and therefore that Providence has ordained that 
they can be rightfully and wisely governed only by their 
superiors, no matter whether they acquire and maintain their 
superiority by fraud, intrigue, or violence. He had observed 
society when it was accustomed to pay but little attention, if 
any, to the structure and details of government, and left all 
matters of public concern to drift into channels created by 
those who ruled them with the view of preserving their own 
power. And hence he imitated their imperial example by 
making this principle of paternalism the fundamental basis 
of his society ; but transcended the despotism, of antiquity 
by enslaving -both the minds and bodies of its members, and 
annihilating all sense of personality among them. This so- 
ciety, consequently, has never been reconciled to any other 
form of government than absolute monarchy, nor can it ever 
be, so long as it shall exist. Without absolutism in its most 
extreme form it would lose its power of cohesion and fall to 
pieces, as inevitably as a ship drifts away from its course when 
the rudder is broken. 

Having become thus familiar with the constitution and 
organization of this society, and the principles which under- 
lie them, it is equally important to discover how these were 
administered by Loyola himself, and his immediate successors; 
for otherwise its real character can not be known. It has a 
history of its own — created by itself, and, in a great measure, 
66 



GOVERNMENT OF THE SOCIETY. 67 

when not subject to the inspection of others — and unless we 
shall become also familiar with this it will be hard, if not 
impossible, to understand the fierce and tireless animosity 
with which it has resisted all who have endeavored to block 
its way to universal dominion, including even popes and the 
Church. If any other society ever had such a history, it has 
not been written. 

When Loyola obtained the approval of his society from 
Paul III, he undoubtedly accomplished a great triumph — 
greater than any he had previously known. It gave him 
the opportunity of foreseeing that, whensoever thereafter it 
should be demanded by his own or the interests of the so- 
ciety, he would have it in his power, with a servile host at 
his command, to create a factious rivalry to the papacy it- 
self. It may be supposed that the pope acted with reference 
to what he regarded as the welfare of the Church, and under 
a due sense of his own responsibility; but Loyola experi- 
enced no such feeling. Backed by a mere handful of zealots, 
who were unable to withstand his importunities, and from 
whom he probably concealed his ulterior designs, he concen- 
trated all his energies upon the single object of obtaining 
the centralization of power in his own hands, without troub- 
ling himself to inquire at whose expense it might be accom- 
plished, or the means to be employed. The pope had his 
own character as the head of the Church to maintain, while 
Loyola was a mere ' ' soldier of fortune," seeking adventure, 
and stimulated by personal ambition to acquire both power 
and fame by means of an organization with which the pope 
was not familiar, but which he had constructed in secret, so 
as to make possible any form of disguise or dissimulation 
necessary to accomplish his desired ends. It would be un- 
fair to assert, in the absence of explicit proof, that the pope 
acted otherwise than with reference primarily to the interests 
of the Church, whilst at the same time he manifestly did 
not desire to weaken the papal — that is, his own — power. 
Although he ordered the assembling of what afterwards be- 
came the Council of Trent, he was not distinguished as a 



68 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

reforming pope, inasmuch as he was understood to have been 
constrained to this act to counteract the imperial policy of 
Charles V, who had threatened a National Council in his 
own dominions. Yet it is possible that some reforms might 
have been introduced to which he would have given his as- 
sent, provided they had not lessened the authority of the 
papacy. Loyola was not influenced by any of these motives. 
He attributed the corruptions of the clergy and the disturbed 
condition of the Church to the imbecility of the popes, and 
their inability to contend successfully against the impending 
evils. And thus influenced, he evidently hoped to put in 
operation, through the agency of his new society, such in- 
strumentalities as would counteract the existing evils in a 
manner that would assure the glory of the achievement to 
himself and his society. He doubtless desired in this way to 
obtain such fame as would overshadow the papacy itself. 
Of the contemptuous disregard and defiance of popes who 
have opposed Jesuit pretensions, we shall hereafter see many 
and convincing proofs. 

It should not be forgotten, in this connection, that the 
infallibility of the pope was not, at that time, an accepted 
part of the faith of the Church. The effort to make it so 
would, if then made, have been fruitless, in view of the re- 
cent pontificates of John XXIII, and Julius II, and Alex- 
ander VI, and the decrees of the Councils of Constance and 
Basel, as well as the general sentiment of the Christian 
world. Although there were some in the Church who main- 
tained this doctrine, yet it was far from being approved by 
the multitude, and never actually became part of the faith 
until within our own time, when it was dictated to the Council 
of the Vatican at Rome by Pius IX, and forced to a final 
decree without free discussion. Mr. Gladstone has given a 
list of heretical popes before the time of Loyola, none of 
whom could have been infallible, unless infallibility and 
heresy may mingle harmoniously together in the same mind 
at the same time. Gregory I regarded the claim of univer- 
sality — a necessary incident to infallibility — as " blasphe- 



GOVERNMENT OF THE SOCIETY. 69 

mous, anti-Christian, and devilish." Even Innocent III ad- 
mitted that a pope could " sin against the faith, and thus 
become subject to the judgment of the Church." Hadrian VI 
declared that a pope could err in matters of faith. Zephyri- 
nus and Callistus both taught heresy in maintaining " that 
God the Father became incarnate, and suffered with the 
Son." Liberius subscribed an Arian creed, the most noted 
of all heresies, and condemned the orthodox Athanasius. 
Felix II was an Arian, and yet has been placed upon the cal- 
endar of saints. Zosimus indorsed the heresy of Pelagianism. 
Vigilius was upon both sides of the controversy about the 
Three Chapters. John XXII condemned Nicholas III and 
Clement V as heretics. Honorius was condemned and ex- 
communicated for heresy by a General Council at Constanti- 
nople. Consequently, Mr. Gladstone, whose great learning 
and wisdom is recognized by all, felt himself warranted in 
affirming that " the popes themselves, therefore, for more 
than three centuries, publicly recognized, first, that an Ecu- 
menical Council may condemn a pope for open heresy ; and, 
secondly, that Pope Honorius was justly condemned for 
heresy." 1 

The contest in England about "Catholic Emancipation," 
covered a period of more than a quarter of a century after 
the ill-fated union by which Ireland gave up her independ- 
ence. It terminated so near the present time that there 
are some yet living who may remember the rejoicing it 
occasioned among the friends of Ireland. It involved a 
practical political question, although it had a semi-religious 
aspect. Upon the part of Ireland it was insisted that, as the 
Irish were recognized by the British Constitution as subjects 
of the United Kingdom, they were entitled to hold civil 
office and participate in the legislation of Parliament. This 
was for a long time successfully resisted by the English Gov- 



1 Eome and the Newest Fashions in Religion. By Gladstone. 
Pages 94 to 102. It is here stated that the "Jesuit General Linez 
[Laynez], strongly advocated papal infallibility in the Council 
of Trent, . . . hut the Council left the question undecided." 



70 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

ernment and people upon the ground that, by the religion 
which the Irish professed, the pope was held to be infallible, 
and, consequently, as possessing the spiritual power to interfere 
with the temporal affairs and policy of Great Britain. As it 
had been always understood among European peoples that 
this was the legitimate consequence of that doctrine, it be- 
came absolutely necessary to the Irish cause to show that 
the religion which prevailed in Irelaud did not include it; 
in other words, that- the Irish people did not believe the pope 
to be infallible. In proof of this, it was insisted by the 
Irish hierarchy, with unusual earnestuess, that the three 
leading universities in France, and three not less distin- 
guished in Spain, had condemned and repudiated that doc- 
trine, and that the Irish people accepted their opinions. In 
addition, several Irish bishops were examined before a com- 
mittee of the House of Commons, and testified to the same 
effect. This turned the scale in favor of "Irish Emancipa- 
tion," and the controversy ended by the passage of that 
measure by both Houses of Parliament. 

There is nothing, therefore, to show, or tending to 
show, that Loyola considered Paul III, or any other pope, to 
be infallible. On the contrary, inasmuch as that doctrine 
was not a part of the faith of the Church, and he was not 
required to believe it, it is a fair inference, from all we can 
now learn of their intercourse, that he regarded the pope as 
fallible, and, consequently, wedded to a false and errone- 
ous system of Church government, which had been attended 
with mischievous results, and for which he desired to substitute 
a better and more efficient system of his own, under his own 
direction. And all the contemporary facts combine to show 
that he intended, by the original Jesuit Constitution, to bring 
the pope, and through him the Church, to the point of recog- 
nizing him and his successors as infallible, because they were 
declared to stand in the place of Christ, and were to be 
obeyed accordingly. Whatsoever benefits he proposed to 
confer upon the Church, were intended by him to be conse- 



GOVERNMENT OF THE SOCIETY. 71 

quential alone upon those he designed for himself and his 
society. 

The amendment of the original constitution, so as to re- 
quire fidelity to the pope, was simply a measure of policy 
and expediency on the part of Loyola, having been sug- 
gested to him, as we have seen, after he reached Rome and 
discovered that it was the only method of removing the scru- 
ples of the pope, and obtaining the approval of his new so- 
ciety. Interpreted, therefore, in the light of all the facts, 
this amendment amounts only and simply to a recognition of 
the pope as the head of the Church, but not infallible, be- 
cause that was not then part of the faith of the Church. At 
the same time, however, Loyola was sagacious enough to pro- 
vide in the body of the constitution for the infallibility of 
the general of his society by declaring him as equal to God, 
and as occupying the place and exercising the authority of 
Christ. He expected the pope to recognize this by his act 
of approving the original constitution and establishing the 
society as a religious order, in imitation of the ancient mo- 
nastic orders. Whether the pope so understood the constitu- 
tion or not, can not now be decided ; but it is perfectly 
apparent that Loyola did, as is evidenced by the fact that 
the vow of each member pledged him to this belief as one of 
the absolutely controlling principles of the organization. But 
Loyola made a more conspicuous exhibition of his sagacity 
by providing, in the secret but practical working of the so- 
ciety, a loophole of escape from the pledge of obedience to 
the pope whensoever the general deemed this expedient, as, 
in the sequel, it will appear he frequently did. It is well to 
repeat here, for illustration, that the pope was not permitted 
to hold immediate or direct intercourse with the individual 
members of the society. He was required to regard them 
only as a company whose members had no power over them- 
selves, and were expressly prohibited from setting up any 
individual claim to independent thought or action. The 
pope could consequently convey his desires, or opinions, or 



72 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

commands to the society only through their general ; that is, 
in Loyola's view, as well as in that of the society, the fallible 
head of the Church could make known his wishes to the in- 
fallible head of the society ! If the latter occupied the place 
of God and pronounced his judgments — as the members de- 
clared by their vows, and the constitution asserts — then any 
violation of his commands upon their part was not only 
heresy within the society, but punishable by the general, no 
matter what the pope might do or say. The infallible head 
of the Jesuits became, consequently, in the estimation of the 
society, superior to the fallible head of the Church in every- 
thing that concerned the opinions, sentiments, or action of 
the members. A man would almost stultify himself who 
should argue that, in case of conflict between the pope and 
the general — which has frequently occurred — the society 
would hesitate about obeying the general and disobeying the 
pope. 

This point requires deliberate consideration, for it is that 
at which the commanding ability and shrewdness of Loyola 
were exhibited most conspicuously. The society is allowed to 
know its general only upon all matters involving either duty 
or conduct. He, and not the pope, or any other authority 
upon ea,rth, determines what the members shall or shall not 
do within the whole domain of individual or company action. 
The members are required and pledged by their solemn vows 
to think his thoughts, to utter his words, to execute his com- 
mands, and to suppress every emotion not in sympathy with 
his. And hence it has sometimes happened, in precise con- 
sistence with the plan of Loyola, that the Jesuits have obeyed 
the pope when commanded to do so by their general ; whilst, 
at other times, his wishes have been disregarded and opposed 
by them because their general has so commauded. He alone 
is the god of the society, and nothing but his electric touch 
can galvanize their dead corpses into life and action. Until 
he speaks, they are like serpents coiled up in their wintry 
graves, lifeless and inactive; but the moment he gives the 
word of command, each member springs instantaneously to 



GOVERNMENT OF THE SOCIETY. 73 

his feet, leaving unfinished whatsoever may have engaged 
him, ready to assail whomsoever he may require to be as- 
sailed, and to strike wheresoever he shall direct a blow to be 
stricken. Summed up, it amounts to this, that if the pope 
decides according to the will of the general, he is obeyed, 
because in that case the members show obedience to the gen- 
eral, according to their vow, and not to the pope, whose 
wishes they know only through the general ; whereas, when- 
soever the pope decides contrary to the will of the general, 
he is disobeyed if the general shall so require, because the 
members have religiously vowed to accept his commands as 
expressing the will of God infallibly. With them the high- 
est tribunal in the world is that presided over by him. He 
alone is equal to God. From all other judgments there may 
be appeal ; but his are irreversible. 

The people of Europe were beginning to feel the influ- 
ence of the Reformation — at the period here referred to — so 
extensively, especially in Germany, as to comprehend the 
fact that the evils which had afflicted them, as well as the 
decaying condition of the Church, were attributable to the 
long-continued union of Church and State. And their in- 
creasing intelligence caused them at least to suspect, if not 
absolutely to foresee, that a secret and mysterious society 
like that of the Jesuits would tend to increase rather than 
diminish these evils. That the Jesuits encountered this sus- 
picion from the beginning, is as plainly proven in history as 
any other fact. Patient investigation will show how they 
were resisted in France, England, Germany, Spain, and 
Portugal, as plainly as the rivulet may be traced from 
its mountain sources to the sea. And he who does not take 
the pains to make himself familiar with the current of 
events to which this resistance gave rise, will fall far short 
of accurate knowledge of the philosophy of history. Nor, 
when he has acquired this information, will it surprise him 
in the least to know that, after Loyola had succeeded in pro- 
viding for himself and his successors the means of possibly 
becoming superior to the pope and the Church, he encoun- 



74 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

tered also the formidable opposition of the existing religious 
orders, as well as almost the entire body of the Christian 
people, when he undertook to introduce his new and strangely- 
constituted society into the various States of Europe. 
Even then, before the Jesuits had practically exhibited their 
capacity for intrigue, the public mind became convinced that 
the organization contained elements of mischief, if not of 
positive danger, which it was the duty of society to suppress 
rather than allow to be developed. From that time up till 
the present, nothing has occurred to remove this general im- 
pression, but much to strengthen and confirm it. So stead- 
fastly imbedded has it become in the minds of the English- 
speaking race that they have invented and added to their 
language the new word, "Jesuitism," to signify the extrem- 
est degree of "cunning, deceit, hypocrisy, prevarication, de- 
ceptive practices to effect a purpose." There was nothing in 
the life and character of Loyola to remove this impression; 
but, on the contrary, as all his movements were shrouded in 
mystery, and the public had no sympathy for him, nor he 
any for the public, his whole conduct tended to excite sus- 
picion against him and his society. Accordingly, even with 
the aid he may be supposed to have derived from the in- 
dorsement of the pope, he had to fight his way inch by inch 
among the Christian peoples of Europe — a fact of command- 
ing significance. 

The order of Dominicans had existed, under the patron- 
age of the Church, for over three hundred years, and had 
made itself conspicuous for the part it took in the war of 
extermination prosecuted by Innocent III against the Albi- 
genses, for having asserted the right to free religious thought 
and worship. The Dominicans were not restrained, there- 
fore, by sympathy with any of the heresies which Loyola 
expressed the desire to suppress; so far from this, they 
sought after the most active and certain methods of putting 
an end to all heresy. Hence, it may be accepted as certain 
that they would willingly have accepted the Jesuits as coad- 
jutors in the work of checking the progress of the Re forma- 



GOVERNMENT OF THE SOCIETY. 75 

tion if they had not seen in Loyola something to excite their 
indignation rather than their friendship. The conduct of the 
Jesuits at Salamanca, in Spain, had this effect in a high de- 
gree. Melchior Cano, one of the most distinguished and 
orthodox of the Dominican monks, having seen and con- 
versed with Loyola at Rome, under circumstances which en- 
abled him to form an estimate of his character, did not hes- 
itate to denounce the Jesuits as impostors. What he said of 
Loyola personally deserves special notice, and was in these 
emphatic words: 

" When I was in Rome I took it into my head to see 
this Ignatius. He began at once, without preliminary, to 
talk of his virtue, and the persecution he had experienced 
in Spain without deserving it in the least. And a vast deal 
of mighty things he poured forth concerning the revelations 
which he had from on high, though there was no need of the 
disclosure. This induced me to look upon him as a vain man, 
and not to have the least faith in his revelations." Referring 
also to the Jesuits, as a society molded and governed by 
Loyola, he said " he apprehended the coming of Antichrist, 
and believed the Jesuits to be his forerunners," and charged 
them with " licentiousness," and the practice of " abominable 
mysteries." 2 

This was the first experience that Loyola had in dealing 
with so conspicuous an adversary as Melchior Cano, and he 
realized the necessity of having him silenced in some way, so 
as to preserve his own personal influence. It furnished him, 
therefore, an opportunity — perhaps the first — to display his 
fitness for leadership, as well as to instruct his society in the 
indirect and artful methods by which he expected it, when 
necessary, to accomplish its objects. By means of the pope's 
bull approving the society, and the authority he claimed to 
have been conferred upon him by it, he succeeded in induc- 
ing the general of the Dominicans to cause Melchior to be 
made a bishop and sent to the Canaries, which removed him 



2 History of the Jesuits. By Steinmetz. Vol. I, p. 378. 



76 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

from Spain, and was equivalent to exile. The success he 
won in this way was, however, of short duration ; for Mel- 
chior accepted his banishment for a brief period only, and, 
upon returning to Spain, he renewed his attack upon the 
Jesuits, which then became more violent and undisguised 
than before. He continued it as long as he lived, and at his 
death left this prophetic warning : "If the members of the 
society continue as they have begun, God grant that the time 
may not come when kings will wish to resist them, and will 
find no means of doing so !" 3 

Events, which deserve somewhat more particularity of 
detail, occurred also in Spain, at Saragossa, because they 
explain how the society was trained and disciplined from 
the beginning, under the inspiration of Loyola's immediate 
command. "As the twig is bent, so is the tree inclined," is 
an adage no less applicable to a compact body like the 
Jesuits than to individuals. Loyola understood this, and 
lost no time, after he put his society in working order, to 
teach the members the art of circumventing their adversa- 
ries — an art which their successors, so far from forgetting, 
have improved upon. In this primary lesson he also taught 
them that they were justified in disregarding any human law 
that stood in the way of their success; that public opiniou 
in conflict with their interests was entitled to no respect what- 
soever; and that by steadfastly adhering to the principle of 
monarchism, upon which their society rested, they might 
confidently invoke the aid of monarchs to assure them suc- 
cess in any conflict with the people. And he taught them, 
moreover, that they were entitled to resist the authorities of 
the Church when the latter attempted to check their prog- 
ress. And thus, almost in the infancy of the society, its 
founder fixed indelibly in the mind of every member the 
idea of their superiority over every department of society, 
over all the ancient monastic orders, and over even the 
Church itself, when its authority was employed to check 



3 History of the Jesuits. By Steinroetz. Vol. I, pp. 380-381. 



GOVERNMENT OF THE SOCIETY. 77 

their progress. All this will appear in the conflict about to 
be detailed. 

The city of Saragossa was the capital of Aragon, where 
the law prohibited, by strict and explicit provisions, " the 
erection of a chapel or monastery within a certain distance 
of an established parish church or religious community." 
The Jesuits found a place they desired to occupy, but were 
forbidden to do so by this law, which all others had obeyed, 
and which the public desired to maintain for satisfactory 
reasons. The law, however, did not restrain them in the 
least; and in utter disregard of it, and in open defiance of 
the public authorities, they asserted the right to take pos- 
session of and erect a building upon it for their own uses. 
They proposed to encroach upon the rights of the Augustin- 
ians, when the Franciscans — both being ancient religious or- 
ders of monks — united with the former in resisting this 
threatened violation of public law, which had been, up to 
that time, universally acquiesced in by both these orders, and 
by the public as a prudential measure of public policy. But 
the Jesuits did not consider any law as of the least conse- 
quence when it placed obstructions in their path, and, con- 
sequently, persisted in their purpose despite the protests of 
the Augustinians and the Fransciscans, all of whom were es- 
teemed by the citizens of Saragossa for their sanctity. The 
controversy soon assumed such importance that the vicar- 
general of the Church issued a formal order, in the name 
and by the authority of the Church, whereby he prohibited 
the Jesuits from erecting their new building within the for- 
bidden limits. Any other body of men, professing the least 
respect for the Church and its official representatives, would 
at least have hesitated after this. But the Jesuits paid no 
more respect to the ecclesiastical dignity and authority of 
the vicar-general than they had proposed to show to the exist- 
ing public law, or to the two protesting monastic orders. 
The consequence was, that the vicar-general was constrained, 
in vindication of his authority as the representative of the 
Church, to denounce the Jesuits as heretics for their flagrant 



78 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

disobedience, and to threaten them with excommunication if 
they did not desist. He declared them accursed, and hurled 
the thunders of anathema against them. But the Jesuits, 
realizing how much strength lay in Loyola's single arm, re- 
mained unterrified. These thunders, which had caused even 
monarchs to quake, were powerless against his commands, 
which were communicated to his followers by the superior 
who watched over the interests of the society at Saragossa. 
The latter ordered the ceremony of consecrating the forbidden 
ground to proceed, in the face of both the law and the com- 
mands of the vicar-general ; and the infatuated and dis- 
loyal Jesuits obeyed him. This was a new experience to the 
citizens of the capital of Aragon, who had witnessed noth- 
ing like it before, and they became incensed and thoroughly 
aroused. They took the side of the Augustinians and the 
Franciscans, and the "priests and religious" who defended 
them, and proceeded to display their indignation in such public 
and emphatic manner that it could not be mistaken. The 
historic statement is that " effigies of the Jesuits being pre- 
cipitated into hell by legions of devils, were exhibited in the 
streets, and it was even inculcated among the people that 
the town was profaned by the presence of the Jesuits, who, 
it was declared, had brought heresy into it, and that the 
whole of Saragossa was under excommunication, and would 
so remain until they left it." This account is substantially 
given by all who have undertaken to write the history of the 
Jesuits, but it is taken from Daurignac, one of their ablest 
defenders, whose language is here quoted. He further ex- 
plains the estimate in which the Jesuits were held by the 
people of Saragossa, while obedient to the faith of the 
Roman Church, in these words: "At length the populace, 
whose feelings had been thus worked upon, became more 
violent; and, proceeding to the house of the Jesuits, they 
threw stones, breaking the panes of glass, and threatening 
the inmates with their vengeance, while a procession, similar 
to the one already described, paraded around the ill-fated 



GOVERNMENT OF THE SOCITEY. 79 

house, uttering cries of disapprobation, reproach, and con- 
demnation." * 

In a matter which involved, as this did, the mere en- 
forcement of a public law universally approved, the duty of 
the Jesuits was plain and simple, not admitting of any equiv- 
ocation. Like all others who enjoyed the protection of law, 
they were bound to obey the public authorities, to which was 
superadded their obligation to obey also the vicar-general as 
the official organ of the Church. But the reader should not 
be so far misled as to suppose that they were influenced by 
any such idea, or that they were in the least discouraged by 
the severe ecclesiastical and popular rebuke they received at 
Saragossa. No man understood better than Loyola what 
complete control can be obtained over the sentiments, opin- 
ions, and conduct of individuals by educational training; 
and he had taken the precaution so to discipline the novices 
of his society, from the moment of their initiation, as to 
make their blind and passive obedience the effectual method 
of consolidating his influence and authority over them. It 
is perfectly apparent, from the occurrences at Saragossa, that 
one of the first lessons they had learned was that form of 
obedience which required them to disregard and defy any law 
whatsoever, when commanded by their superiors to do so, 
without inquiring or caring what consequences might follow, 
either to the public or to individuals. Consequently, when 
compelled by the combined influence of the public authori- 
ties, those of the Church, and the indignant population of 
Saragossa, to abandon the erection of their new building 
upon the forbidden ground, they treated it as mere suspen- 
sion, and not abandonment, still intending, by some means 
or other, to overcome this array of adversaries and defeat the 
execution of the law. With this view they ceased opera- 
tions, seemingly yielding to the existing necessity. At this 
point in their history, however, they learned their first lesson 

* History of the Society of Jesus. By Danriguac. Vol. I, 

pp. 82-83. 



80 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

in duplicity and deceit — and the sequel proves how well they 
learned it — by showing that, although apparently discom- 
fited, they did not consider themselves as defeated. Loyola 
himself was not familiar with defeat, when success depended 
in any measure upon strategic intrigues with imperial rulers, 
all of whom fully understood that his society represented the 
most absolute monarchism then existing in Europe, and on 
that account, if no other, required them to extend to it every 
possible degree of protection, especially where, as at Sara- 
gossa, the people had taken active steps to require the en- 
forcement of law. He had also prepared for escaping defeat 
in any matter concerning the Jesuits by fixing in their minds 
the conviction, as a religious sentiment, that there was no 
degree of courage so high and commendable as that exhib- 
ited by them when their obedience was carried to the extent 
of resisting whatsoever and whosoever stood in their way 
when commanded to do so for the interests of the society, 
which he required them to believe was for " the greater glory 
of God!" He had taught them to consider this as courage, 
but it was a misuse of terms so to call it ; for, in its rightful 
sense, courage invokes the best and most ennobling faculties 
of the mind. Instead of this, the sentiment he inculcated 
proceeded from that indifference to public opinion and insen- 
sibility to shame which, as Bartoli concedes, is a necessary 
feature .of Jesuit education. It is rather to be compared to 
the animal instinct of the tiger, which, after his coveted vic- 
tim has once escaped, prompts him to approach it thereafter 
by stealthy steps, crouching in concealment until the time 
shall come when the final plunge may be successfully made. 
The superior of the Jesuits at Saragossa was too well in- 
structed in the policy dictated by Loyola not to understand 
wherein the main and real strength of the society consisted. 
Having, undoubtedly, full knowledge of the designs of Loy- 
ola, and molded to all his purposes, as the human form is 
chiseled from the lifeless block of marble, he proceeded at 
once to invoke the aid of the monarchical power of the Gov- 
ernment of Spain, in order to bring the vicar-general of the 



G VERNMENT OF THE SO CIE TY. 81 

Church, the Augustinian and the Franciscan monks, together 
with the priests and religious who adhered to them, and the 
people and local authorities of Saragossa, into absolute hu- 
miliation at his feet. For the first time, therefore, there was 
then opened to the Jesuits a new and broad field, wherein 
they were incited to display their wonderful capacity for in- 
trigue. They were to be practically taught with what facil- 
ity they could obtain the intervention of monarchical power 
to trample upon the rights of the ancient religious and mo- 
nastic orders, violate the public laws, defy the ecclesiastical 
representatives of the Church, and make the people realize 
how powerless they were to influence the policy of the society, 
to modify its principles, or to impede its progress to the ulti- 
mate dominion it had started out to obtain. 

Charles V was then emperor; but, as he was absent from 
Spain, his daughter, the Princess Jane, was the acting regent, 
with the full possession of imperial power. The superior of 
the Jesuits at Saragossa appealed to her by arguments which, 
although not preserved, may be fairly presumed to have cen- 
tered in the necessity for establishing and preserving the so- 
ciety as the best and most certain method of perpetuating the 
monarchical principle, so absolutely essential to kings that, if 
it were destroyed, they could not exist; or, if they did exist, 
it would be with greatly diminished powers, and subject, in 
some degree, to the control of popular opinion. The regent 
was fully informed of the determination of her imperial 
father to maintain this principle at every hazard, and was 
aware of the fact that he was not at all choice about the 
methods of doing so. She understood how well fitted he was, 
by his vacillating course, for any emergency he might en- 
counter ; and that she was not mistaken in his character, his- 
tory attests by the facts that, although a native of the Neth- 
erlands, he persecuted his own countrymen for daring to 
assert freedom of conscience for themselves; and at one time 
plotted with the king of France against the pope, at another 
with the pope against the king of France, and at still another 
succeeded in enticing the Protestants of Germany into an 

6 



82 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

offensive alliance against both. As the representative of such 
a monarch — so unscrupulous about the means employed, 
either by himself or by others, in his behalf — the regent be- 
came a willing and easy convert to the appeal of the Jesuit 
superior. Holding both the law and public opinion in con- 
tempt, and looking upon the people as having no rights 
which kings were bound to recognize, she took the side of 
the Jesuits at Saragossa, and at once inaugurated the meas- 
ures necessary to secure their triumph over all their adver- 
saries. The pope's nuncio in Spain was easily brought to the 
same side, because it was the royal side; and, thus supported, 
the Jesuits soon reached the end they had sought after so 
anxiously by their triumphal re-entry into Saragossa, and the 
compulsory submission of the vicar-general, the Augustinians, 
the Franciscans, the priests, and the people! No combina- 
tion which all these could then form could any longer resist 
the power and insolence of the Jesuits, when backed by the 
enormous monarchical power which Charles V had placed in 
the regent's hands. Daurignac, the Jesuit historian, tells 
all this in praise of his society, boastingly informing his 
readers how the vicar-general was ''compelled to remove the 
ban of excommunication," and how the Jesuits were thereby 
enabled peacefully "to take possession of their house," and 
occupy it without further resistance. Of course, their adver- 
saries were all subdued, not because of any change of opin- 
ion with regard to the Jesuits, but because they feared to 
disobey the regent, who held in her hands the power of the 
merciless Charles V. And the Jesuits, with the vanity in- 
spired by success, marched the streets of Saragossa, through 
the subdued and humiliated crowd, in such conspicuous ex- 
ultation as told emphatically with what indifference and con- 
tempt they looked upon human institutions and laws, or the 
rights of the monastic orders, or the sanction of local eccle- 
siastical authority, or municipal regulations, or the interests 
and sentiments of the people, or all these combined, when 
they undertook to place a check upon their ambition, or sub- 



GOVERNMENT OF THE SOCIETY. 83 

ject them to any other obedience than that they had vowed 
to their superior. 5 

These details, under ordinary circumstances, might seem 
tedious to the general reader, but they are justified by their 
necessity in showing how the Jesuits obtained their first sig- 
nal triumph. There has been a long list of similar triumphs 
since then to which this contributed. The events themselves, 
in so far as they involve merely the occupation and use of a 
piece of ground, are comparatively insignificant; but they 
serve, far better than many of greater magnitude, to display 
the prominent and most dangerous characteristics of the Jes- 
uits. They show their absolute disregard of all rights and 
interests in conflict with their own, and how thoroughly Loy- 
ola succeeded in making this the governing and cardinal 
principle of the society ; and their significance is increased 
by the fact that the affair at Saragossa inaugurated a policy 
which the Jesuits have steadily pursued throughout their his- 
tory, varying their methods according to the character of the 
objects they have endeavored to attain. In this sense, they 
are introductory to a proper estimate of them. 



5 Daurignac, Yol. I, pp. 84, 85. 



CHAPTER V. 

STRUGGLES AND OPPOSITION. 

The assistance rendered to the Jesuits at Saragossa by 
the regent, in the name of the Emperor Charles V, very 
greatly encouraged them. It gave them assurance of royal 
sympathy with the monarchical principles of their constitu- 
tion, and taught them how to invoke that sympathy success- 
fully in future controversies with their adversaries, although 
the latter might be ecclesiastics in the active service of the 
Church. 

At Toledo, in Spain, they also eucountered formidable 
opposition. On account of divers abuses and "many super- 
stitious practices" which prevailed among them, the Cardinal- 
Archbishop of Toledo was constrained to condemn and re- 
prove them in a public ordinance, whereby he prohibited the 
Christian people from confessing to them ''under pain of ex- 
communication," and required "all curates to exclude them 
from the administration of the sacraments." It should be 
understood from this, of course, that they must have been 
guilty of some extraordinary and flagrant conduct, or they 
would not have been so harshly dealt with by so distinguished 
a functionary of the Church as a cardinal-archbishop, to 
whom the management of the affairs of the Church at To- 
ledo was confided. No other supposition can be indulged, 
especially in view of the fact that, besides this emphatic de- 
nunciation, he placed their college at Alcala under interdict. 
It is impossible, therefore, to escape the conclusion that their 
conduct had brought reproach upon the society and inflicted 
injury upon the Church. But again, as at Saragossa, the 
Jesuits were not discomfited by being placed under the ban 
of ecclesiastical censure, and organized resistance against the 
84 



STRUGGLES AND OPPOSITION. 85 

cardinal-archbishop, as they had done against the vicar-gen- 
eral at Saragossa. Their first effort was to seek the inter- 
vention of the pope — whom they supposed to be under the 
influence of Loyola — that of his nuncio in Spain, and that 
of the Archbishop of Burgos. They hoped in this way to 
overcome all opposition. But the effort was unavailing, for 
the reason that the cardiual-archbishop was so thoroughly 
convinced of their unworthiness that he could not be moved 
from his purpose, and sternly persisted in condemning them. 
Thus failing to obtain the desired assistance from the author- 
ities of the Church, they invoked aid from the temporal and 
monarchical power of the Government, as they had done at 
Saragossa. They had become well assured, by their success 
with the regent, that all who served Charles V were in con- 
stant readiness to do whatsoever was necessary to protect 
their society, even against the highest officials of the Church, 
because of its tendency to preserve and perpetuate the prin- 
ciple of monarchism. They felt entirely secure under royal 
and imperial protection, understanding perfectly well the 
powers wielded by the monarchs of that period, especially 
that of Charles V in Spain. Accordingly they succeeded in 
having proceedings instituted against the cardinal-archbishop, 
who was summoned before the royal court of Spain to show 
cause why he had placed any impediments in the way of the 
Jesuits — why, in other words, he had dared to deny their 
absolute dominion over the regularly-constituted ecclesiastical 
tribunal at Toledo. Loyola understood how to influence the 
court of Spain, and felt entirely convinced, doubtless, that, 
with Charles V upon his side, he could easily bring all his 
enemies at his feet; and, in this instance, he was not disap- 
pointed. The royal court decided in favor of the Jesuits, 
and the cardinal-archbishop was condemned and silenced. 
In order to escape the prison of the Inquisition, he yielded 
obedience at last, and the Jesuits achieved another triumph 
over a distinguished ecclesiastic of the Church. 1 

1 History of the Jesuits. By Nicolini. Page 80. History of the 
Jesuits. By Steinmetz. Vol. I, pp. 382-83. 



86 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

The patronage of the king of Portugal enabled them to 
enter Portugal without difficuly. This so excited their an- 
ticipations of a brilliant and successful future, that they de- 
voted themselves to the acquisition of riches, and fell into 
such vices as, in that day, almost invariably accompanied 
success among both clergy and laity. Nieolini says that, 
after having obtained "immense wealth " in Portugal, they 
" relaxed in the strictness of their conduct, pursued a life of 
pleasure and debauchery," until the king " began to frown 
upon them," and the people to withdraw their respect. 
They had a college at Coimbra which, according to him, 
bore very little resemblance to a cloister. Being no longer 
able, as in Spain, to appeal with confidence to the royal 
power for protection — as the confidence of the king of 
Portugal in their Christian integrity had become shaken — 
Loyola, yet alive, was forced to remove the provincial and 
rector of the college, out of seeming deference to public 
opinion. The new rector, by running and screaming 
through the streets like a madman, and flagellating his naked 
shoulders until they were covered with blood and dust, so 
succeeded in arousing the fears and superstition of the Jesuits 
that they were induced to introduce such reforms in the col- 
lege as enabled them, in some degree, but not entirely, to 
regain their influence. 2 

It is not a little puzzling to those who have not investi- 
gated the history and character of the Jesuits, to understand 
how the immense wealth they acquired in Portugal and else- 
where was obtained, when each member was required to take 
a vow of " extreme poverty." There is, however, nothing 
easier for a Jesuit than to satisfy his own mind upon this 
subject, by aid of the casuistical method of reasoning which 
enables him to escape this, or any other difficulty. Bartoli, 
the biographer of Loyola, explains it in a few words. "The 
vow of poverty," says he, "does not deprive the person who 
is under trial of the ownership of the property which he 



2 Nicoliui, pp. 82-83. 



STRUGGLES AND OPPOSITION. 87 

previously possessed, nor of the possibility of acquiring more, 
until he has obtained a fixed and determined position, al- 
though he is indeed deprived of the use of his property, and 
can not, any more than a professed religious, dispose of a 
single farthing without the consent of his superior." 3 And 
he repeats the same idea at another place, by saying, " The 
vow of poverty does not preclude the possession of prop- 
erty."* Uninitiated minds may be embarrassed by this, but 
it is plain and simple to a Jesuit. He understands that his 
vow of "extreme poverty" does not require him to part 
with the property he has, or prohibit him from obtaining 
more if he can. There is but a single condition attached — 
that it shall be at the disposal of the superior. And thus, 
by the help of the casuists, this wonderful society, composed 
only of those who have solemnly vowed their absolute dis- 
dain of wealth, has, at several periods of its history, become 
the richest in the world, and would be so again if allowed to 
have its own way. The vow of "extreme poverty" means, 
therefore, in the minds of Jesuits, splendid palaces, mar- 
ble churches, magnificent universities, and, in fact, the ab- 
sorption of as much wealth as can be acquired through every 
variety of intrigue, by a body of men who boast that they 
have plucked every human sympathy from their hearts, and 
look upon all the tenderest relations of society with con- 
tempt. No written language furnishes words to convey 
fully to ordinary minds the Jesuit idea of "extreme pov- 
erty." One of the Jesuit fathers, quoted by Bartoli, calls it 
" a rich poverty," as he also does the bondage of the society 
" a free slavery." 5 By familiarizing ourselves with this won- 
derfully dexterous use of words, we may soon learn to un- 
derstand what is meant by white darkness and the black- 
ness of sunlight. 

In all the countries of Europe the first impressions with 
reference to the Jesuits were extremely unfavorable to them, 
and the most decided among those most conspicuous for devo- 

3 History of St. Ignatius Loyola. By Bartoli. Vol. II, p. 57. 
* Ibid., p. 58. 5 Ibid., p. 234. 



88 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

tion to the Church. There was nothing in the life of Loyola 
to inspire confidence, either in him or in his plan of opera- 
tions. He was looked upon as an adventurer, who had 
abandoned a military life only because his person was disfig- 
ured by a wound, in order to acquire distinction in some 
other pursuit. Some of the ecclesiastics — as in the case of 
Melchior the Dominican — were disposed to rebuke his pre- 
sumptuousness in assuming sanctity and superiority; while 
others of them, like the vicar-general at Saragossa and the 
Cardinal-Archbishop of Toledo, considered his teachings as 
tending to encourage heresy, not only because of their novelty, 
but because they blasphemously recognized him and all sub- 
sequent superiors of the Jesuits as equal to God in both at- 
tributes and power. They could not persuade themselves to 
believe that Christianity required them to recognize Loyola 
as infallible, whilst the pope, by the existing faith of the 
Church, remained fallible. Loyola was thus surrounded 
with embarrassments which would have subdued the courage 
of almost any other man. He, however, was rather strength- 
ened than weakened by opposition ; for he belonged to that 
class of men who need the excitement of conflict and the 
spur of necessity to develop their commanding qualities. 
He had laid his plans well and skillfully, and, with a perfect 
knowledge of the condition of society, had prepared to derive 
power from the only sources recognized as possessing it; that 
is, from the pope as head of the Church, and monarchs as 
the possessors of absolute dominion. So long as he could 
avail himself of their united support, he had little or no fear 
of the people, whom he could readily resist and humiliate as 
he had done at Saragossa. He soon realized that he could 
easily brush opposing ecclesiastics out of his way, so long as 
he could retain monarchism as the leading and central prin- 
ciple of his society ; and hence he directed all his efforts to 
the suppression of the Reformation, and to the continued 
union of Church and State, so as to give additional strength 
to monarchism, upon which, as a reserved force, he could 
fall back whensoever the interests of his society and the 



STRUGGLES AND OPPOSITION. 89 

exigencies of his affairs required it. Whilst the bulk of 
society were unable to penetrate his secret purposes and mo- 
tives, enough transpired, even during the life of Loyola, to 
excite general suspicion against his own and the integrity of 
his society, on which account it was that he encountered 
such formidable opposition to the introduction of his society 
into Spain, and its loss of influence and reputation in Portu- 
gal, both of which States w 7 ere eminently devoted to the 
Roman Catholic religion. In obedience to the general rule, 
that "the same causes produce the same results," the opposi- 
tion to Loyola and his society became more violent and pro- 
tracted in France than in either Spain or Portugal. The 
reason for this may be found in the peculiarity of the Church 
organization existing there ; but from whatsoever cause it 
may have arisen, the long and tedious controversy which at 
last secured the admission of the Jesuits into France, is not 
merely historically instructive, but throws a flood of light 
upon Jesuit policy and character. 

The French Christians had for a long period refused to 
concede to the pope the right to interfere with the temporal 
affairs of that kingdom. This attitude was so persistently 
maintained by them that what they considered their "liber- 
ties" came to be generally recognized as the foundation of 
the French or Gallican Church, as distinguished from the 
Papal Church at Rome. They regarded themselves under 
the jurisdiction of the pope in spiritual matters — that is, in 
so far as religious faith was concerned — but maintained that 
the domestic policy of France, in the management of her 
own temporal and internal affairs, could not be so mingled 
with Christian faith as to confer upon the pope any right to 
dictate or interfere with that policy. Upon these points 
there was entire unanimity among them before the time of 
Loyola, or if any opposing sentiment existed it was too in- 
considerable to influence the public judgment. 

When the attempt was first made to introduce the Jesuits 
into France the knowledge of their operations elsewhere led 
to the belief — at all events, the fear — that the society could 



90 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

not exist there without conflicting with the Gallican liber- 
ties, and subjecting the French Christians to foreign author- 
ity more odious than that of the pope, to whom they had 
steadily refused the concession of any temporal power over 
them. They were willing then, as they had always been, to 
look to the pope for the regulation of all affairs of the 
Church that concerned religious faith; but it was impossible 
for them to admit the superior jurisdiction claimed by Loy- 
ola without conferring upon him authority and distinction 
they had denied to the pope, and creating a threatening an- 
tagonism to the liberties they had long enjoyed, and which 
distinguished them from other Roman Catholic populations 
of Europe. They could readily see that if the Jesuits, under 
the guidance of an ambitious adventurer like Loyola, were 
permitted to establish this jurisdiction, it would surely lead 
to interference by his society with the temporal affairs and 
interests of the kingdom. Consequently the Gallican Chris- 
tians, backed by their highest ecclesiastical authorities, sternly 
resisted the introduction of the Jesuits into France. They 
could not have done otherwise without a tame and absolute 
forfeiture of their boasted liberties. As neither Loyola nor 
his followers had any respect whatsoever for this Christian 
sentiment, notwithstanding it was maintained with extraor- 
dinary unanimity in France, and persisted in the effort to 
plant the Jesuit society in the midst of it with the view of 
its extermination, an exciting and angry struggle ensued, in 
which the Jesuits displayed their habitual disregard of public 
opinion, and whatsoever else stood in the way of their suc- 
cess. Neither the interests of the French Church, nor the 
sentiments and wishes of the French people, nor the possi- 
bility of imperiling the cause of Christianity, nor any other 
consideration beside that of their own triumph, weighed the 
weight of a feather with them when in conflict with their 
secret plans and purposes. 

The Jesuits sought the aid of the pope, and through him 
that of the king of France, so that by the combined influ- 
ence of the spiritual and the temporal powers, they might 



STRUGGLES AND OPPOSITION. 91 

bring to bear upon the French Church and people such 
pressure as would render them powerless to resist encroach- 
ment upon liberties long held in religious veneration. Their 
manifest object was to center this union of Church and State 
upon what they considered the only "legitimate authority," 
with the special view of engrafting upon the faith of the 
Gallican Christians the principle of "uninquiring obedience" 
to whatsoever policy should be dictated by the interests of 
that combination, whether relating to spiritual or temporal 
affairs. Realizing how readily the pope yielded to the en- 
treaties and influence of Loyola in approving his society, it 
was doubtless supposed that he would as readily be persuaded 
to secure the co-operation of the king, whose temporal power 
would thus be invoked to bring the French Church and 
people to obey whatsoever the Jesuits should dictate. The 
scheme was adroitly planned, and displayed, not only the 
despotic policy of the Jesuits, but their unsurpassed capacity 
for cunning and intrigue. 

During the reign of Henry II, France had become, in a 
large degree, relieved from the complications in which she 
had been involved in the lifetime of Francis I, his father, 
growing out of the protracted controversy in which the Em- 
peror Charles V and the pope both bore conspicuous parts. 
He was enabled therefore to turn his attention to internal 
and domestic affairs, which placed him in a condition favor- 
able to the adoption of any methods of procedure that prom- 
ised to bring society into perfect obedience to monarchical 
dominion ; or, as he, along with Loyola and the Jesuits, re- 
garded it, to "legitimate authority." Loyola could not fail 
to realize that the occasion was most opportune for him, and 
therefore availed himself of it with the utmost promptitude, 
taking advantage of everything seemingly favorable to the 
ends he desired to accomplish. The Reformation had pro- 
gressed with astonishing rapidity, and nothing aroused his 
ambition so much as the hope of arresting its progress; for 
without the stimulating influence of that object his occupa- 
tion would have been threatened with a speedy ending, and 



92 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

his society would have expired almost at its birth. Tins 

would have caused him to sink down into an inconspicuous 
position, condemned alike by ecclesiastics and people as a 
disturber of the public peace. 

In addition to what the Reformation had accomplished 

in Germany — where its defenders had been inspirited by the 
presence, intrepidity, and eloquence of Luther — its influences 
had become so extended in France as to alarm all who saw 
in it the probable loss ot* power, and the end of those op- 
pressions by which they had so long and successfully main- 
tained their authority. Protestant churches were erected, 
not only in Paris, but in all the principal cities and in everv 
province of France. Henry II saw all this with intense dis- 
satisfaction, and was therefore in a condition to look favor- 
ably upon suggestions from any quarter that would rive 
promise of forcing back the advancing tide ot' popular en- 
lightenment and Protestant progress. He inherited from his 
father the most intense malignity toward what he called the 
"new religion." mainly on account, unquestionably, of its 
tendency to endanger the absolutism of monarchy. And he 
also inherited a persecuting spirit, which, by indulgence, had 

Outgrown that ot his father. All students ot' French history 
are familiar with the chief events ot' his reign, which caused 
Henry of Navarre— afterwards Henry [V— Anthony do Hour- 
bon, Louis de Comic, Admiral de Coligny, Francis d'Andelot. 
and other lords, to unite with the reformers, and place them- 
selves in the lead of the Huguenots. With such accessions 
as these, the persecuted Protestants of France became formi- 
dable in all parts of the country, and Henry II found em- 
ployment for all his royal resources in contriving methods 
for their suppression, an object of which he seldom lost Bight 
Wheresoever Protestantism appeared, the spirit of persecu- 
tion rose up to extinguish it. An eminent French historian 
says: "During the reign of Francis 1, within the space of 
twenty-three years, there had been eighty-one executions for 
heresy. During that of Henry II, twelve years, there were 
ninety-seven for the same cause; and at one of these exeeu- 



STRUGGLES AND OPPOSITION. 93 

tions Henry II was present in person on the space in front 
of Notre Dame, a spectacle which Francis I had always re- 
fused to see." He states also that during the reign of 
Henry II, and the year before his death, "fifteen capital 
sentences had been executed in Dauphiny, in Normandy, in 
Poitou, and at Paris," and that, within that period, the 
penal legislation against heretics had been greatly increased 
in severity. 6 

Francis II was distinguished for nothing so much as for 
his uncompromising animosity to the Reformation, to all its 
legitimate fruits, and to those who professed Protestantism. 
He was entirely under the dominion of the Guises, who 
were the bloodiest and most unrelenting persecutors in 
France. To signalize his submission to them, he issued a 
royal proclamation, which they dictated, for razing to the 
ground and demolishing the houses in which the Protestants 
met for religious worship. Protestant assemblages were de- 
clared unlawful, and those who attended them were punish- 
able with death, as were also those who sheltered and pro- 
tected them. In about five months of this merciless reign, 
"eighteen persons were burned alive for heresy" — that is, 
for having professed the Protestant religion. 7 

In this condition France opened a broad and attractive 
field of operations for the Jesuits. Keeping steadily in 
view the principal and primary purpose of their organiza- 
tion — the suppression of the Reformation — they must have 
thirsted for an opportunity to bring their peculiar tactics 
into practice, not only for the accomplishment of this cher- 
ished object, but to reduce the Gallican Christians into such 
obedience to the papacy as would subject the temporal affairs 
of France to the dominion of Rome, when they expected to 
become, through the influence of Loyola over the pope, the 
chief agents in executing the papal mandates. The Cardinal 
of Lorraine — one of the Guises — was in full sympathy with 



6 Outlines of the History of France. Abridged from Guizot, by 
Gustave Masson. Pages 283-285. 7 Ibid. , p. 287. 



94 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

them ; and as he had been instrumental in dictating the per- 
secuting policy of Henry II and Francis I, he must have 
rejoiced at the opportunity of obtaining Jesuit assistance in 
a work so congenial to himself and them. He was " inordi- 
nately vain ; intensely selfish ; an adept in the art of dis- 
simulation, which he used without scruple," — and these 
qualities must have commended him to the Jesuits, as they, 
on account of possessing the same, were doubtless com- 
mended to him. That he was ambitious and a special 
favorite of the pope is indicated by the multiplicity of 
offices he filled at the same time. Besides being cardinal, he 
held two archbishoprics, six bishoprics, and was abbot for 
each of four monasteries. 8 

Such a man as the Cardinal of Lorraine could, of course, 
render most essential aid to the Jesuits, as the Jesuits could 
to him. He and Loyola were "par nobile fratrum" each 
possessing such qualities as fitted him to become a proficient 
auxiliary of the other in the pursuit of a common object. 
After he had succeeded in combining agaiust the French 
Protestants all who were uuder royal influence, he hastened 
to Rome, where, under the immediate auspices of the pope, 
he desired to arrange with Loyola personally for the intro- 
duction of the Jesuits into France. To facilitate the measure, 
he proposed the establishment of the Inquisition in France, 
with the purpose of disposing of heretics according to the 
method employed against the Albigenses by Innocent III, and 
which had been, after many years of disuse, successfully re- 
vived in Italy, Spain, and Portugal, under papal patronage and 
protection. He was received with marked distinction at Rome 
by both the pope and Loyola; and, having experienced no diffi- 
culty in obtaining their approval of his proposed plan of op- 
erations, he returned to France to carry it into execution by 
exterminating Protestantism, destroying the liberties of the 
Gallican Christians, and re-establishing the unity of religious 



8 Church of France. By Jervis. Vol. I, p. 129. History of the 
Jesuits. By Steinmitz. Vol. I, p. 390, and note 1. 



STRUGGLES AND OPPOSITION. 95 

faith by inquisitorial compulsion. He found the king still 
in full sympathy with him, and consequently had no diffi- 
culty in procuring from him royal letters-patent, by which 
he gave his consent to the Jesuits to enter France as an or- 
ganized religious society, to build a house and college in 
Paris, and to ''live therein according to their rules and 
statutes." 9 

These facts — narrated with all possible brevity — show the 
extraordinary means of which Loyola availed himself, in his 
lifetime, to force his society into France in opposition to the 
Gallican Church, the almost entire body of the Gallican 
Christians, and the people. Relying upon the aid of the 
pope, the king, the Cardinal of Lorraine, and such courtiers 
as crowded about the royal palace and echoed the royal will, 
he expected to overcome all opposition, and, by employing 
the terrible machinery of the Inquisition, to make himself 
master of France, or prepare the way for his successors to 
do so. And thus the founder and builder of the Jesuit so- 
ciety himself stamped upon it one of its leading and most 
distinguishing characteristics — the utter disregard of every- 
thing that does not contribute to its own ends and objects. 

But the enemies of the Jesuits in France were not so 
easily reduced to submission as the Cardinal of Lorraine, 
the pope, and Loyola had supposed. The powerful combi- 
nation they had formed, with the assistance of the king and 
his courtiers, was not sufficient to remove or counteract the 
deep-seated antipathy existing in France against the Jesuits. 
The orders of the king were not mandatory without the ap- 
proval of Parliament, which was the highest public repre- 
sentative body in France. When the letters-patent of the 
king, admitting the Jesuits, came before Parliament, they 
were rejected with great unanimity, for the avowed reason 
that their introduction into France would be prejudicial to 
the public welfare and the Gallican Christians. 10 The bulk 
of the French clergy, and the entire faculty of of the Urn- 



s' Steinnietz, Vol. I, pp. 391-92. ™lbid., p. 392. 



96 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

versity of Paris, also took strong and decided grounds 
against the Jesuits. The king, offended by this opposition 
to his royal will, and assuming an air of monarchical su- 
premacy, commanded Parliament to register his letters-patent. 
But Parliament again refused, and appealed for advice to 
the Archbishop of Paris — the chief ecclesiastical functionary 
of the Church. The archbishop also decided against the 
Jesuits. The Faculty of Theology in the university unani- 
mously charged them, among other things, with arrogant 
presumption in assuming "the unusual title of the name of 
Jesus," and with admitting into their society "all sorts of 
persons, however criminal, lawless, and infamous they may 
be." They further declared the society to be "dangerous as 
to matters of faith, capable of disturbing the peace of the 
Church, overturning the monastic orders, and were more 
adapted to break down than to build up." This severe in- 
dictment is made more important and conspicuous by the 
fact that it was not preferred by Protestants, but by Roman 
Catholics, who had for many centuries faithfully adhered 
to such teachings of the Church as had universally prevailed, 
before the popes, in imitation of temporal monarchs, had 
built up the papal system. In addition to all this, the Arch- 
bishop of Paris issued an interdict against them, forbidding 
their exercise of any of the sacred functions. 11 The Bishop 
of Paris followed with other interdictions, and the entire 
clergy denounced the Jesuits in the pulpits. Placards in 
censure of them were hawked about the streets. At last the 
public indignation against them became so intense and vio- 
lent that they were driven out of Paris, and compelled to 
seek shelter elsewhere. They did this, however, as they had 
done when forced by the popular tumult to leave Saragossa ; 
that is, with the seeming appearance of submission, but with 
the real purpose of renewing their efforts when some occasion 
attended by more favorable circumstances should arise — 



11 Steinmetz, Vol. I, p. 395; Nicolini, p. 86; Apud Cretineau, Vol. I, 
p. 320; Coudrette, Vol. I, p. 42. 



STRUGGLES AND OPPOSITION. 97 

when the royal authority could be more successfully em- 
ployed to defy the Gallican Church and the popular senti- 
ment. This was at that time, has been ever since, and is 
to-day, an essential part of Jesuit tactics, in the pursuit of 
which they are persistent and tireless. And where they 
have had the united aid of popes and monarchs, of Church 
and State, they have generally succeeded among populations 
not awakened by Protestant influences to a just appreciation 
of their own rights and dignity. In the case we have been 
considering they did not have very long to wait before the 
king, the Cardinal of Lorraine, and their allies, patronized by 
the pope, secured for them a conspicuous triumph over pub- 
lic opinion in France. The combination formed for that 
purpose needed their assistance in the bloody and congenial 
work of persecution, and this furnished a pretext for their 
introduction into France, notwithstanding the odium in 
which they were almost universally held. Nicolini says : 
"Soon they were called into France to help and cheer that 
atrocious and cruel hecatomb, that bloody debauch of 
priests and kings — the Saint Bartholomew." 12 

Thus far a clear and distinct view is furnished of the es- 
timate in which the Jesuits were held during the lifetime of 
their founder by those who were steadfastly obedient to the 
Christian teachings of the Roman Church. None of the op- 
position here noted came from Protestants, but alone from 
those attached to the Church which the Jesuits professed to 
be serving. It originated with those who had a most favor- 
able opportunity of becoming familiar with the general char- 
acter and purposes of Loyola, many of whom, in all proba- 
bility, had opportunities of seeing and conversing with him, 
as Melchior, the Dominican monk, had done. His boasts of 
extraordinary sanctity, of his frequent interviews with Christ 
and the Virgin Mary, and his impious pretense that he oc- 
cupied the place of God in the world, and, like him, possessed 
miraculous powers, misled very few besides those who became 



i 2 Nicolini, p. 88. 



98 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

his minions, or those who expected to profit by alliance with 
him. We shall see all this still more fully in the subsequent 
events which attended the final introduction of the society 
into France, all of which combine to show the methods by 
which, in the course of time, it became odious to the Chris- 
tian populations of Europe, was expelled iguominiously from 
all the Christian nations, and was, at last, when its iniquities 
could be patiently borne no longer, suppressed and abolished 
by a pope distinguished for his Christian virtue and purity 
of life. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE STRUGGLE FOR FRANCE. 

The facts stated in the last chapter prove incontestably 
that the persistent efforts of the Jesuits to procure the estab- 
lishment of their society in France as a recognized religious 
order were insidious and stealthy, if not incendiary, from the 
beginning. The Bishop of Clermont — influenced, probably, 
by the Cardinal of Lorraine — was favorable to them ; and 
being the owner of a house in Paris, he offered it to them, 
that they might inaugurate the Jesuit method of education. 
But neither the French Parliament, nor the universities, nor 
the Gallican Church could be prevailed upon to withdraw 
their opposition. Consequently, in order to accomplish by 
indirection what was forbidden by law and the public senti- 
ment, the Jesuits opened a college at Clermont, within the 
diocese and under the patronage of the bishop, and beyond 
the limits of the city of Paris. 1 

By the time of the death of Henry II the growth of 
Protestantism in France had become conspicuously marked. 
The Jesuit historian, Daurignac, represents this as a "calam- 
ity" — as a "deplorable state of things" — which it became 
necessary to counteract by the most active and efficient 
means. But as nothing could shake the stability of the peo- 
ple of Paris, it was deemed necessary to reach the population 
of that city by gradual approaches, after the manner of mil- 
itary commanders. Accordingly the Bishop of Pamiers was 
induced to solicit the assistance of the Jesuits in his diocese, 
and had no difficulty in finding enough of them to engage 
in that mission, for they were held in constant readiness to 
obey the orders of their superior. These Jesuit missionaries 

1 Daurignac, Vol. I, p. 36. 

99 



100 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

are represented as having caused many who had professed 
Protestantism to renounce their "heretical errors," and as 
having commenced their educational plan of operations by 
establishing a college at Pamiers. Whatsoever else they did, 
they obeyed implicitly the teachings of their society, for it is 
boastingly said that they caused the Protestants to be treated 
as possessing no rights of citizenship worthy of regard; for 
"their books were destroyed and their preachers compelled to 
flee." 2 But the Jesuits were still unable, by these violent 
means, to obtain entrance into Paris, the combined opposition 
of the Gallican Christians and the Protestants — who had, by 
this time, become sufficiently numerous to take part in the 
controversy — being sufficiently formidable to keep them out. 
While there is no evidence of a direct and positive al- 
liance between the Gallican Christians and the Protestants, 
yet it is apparent that their united opposition to the Jesuits 
had created between them such common sentiments as mate- 
rially softened the asperities which had previously separated 
them. This is seen in the fact that large and influential 
numbers of the former — notably many in Parliament and at- 
tached to the universities — became disposed to grant to the 
latter "entire freedom in the propagation of their doctrines 
and control of their clergy." 3 Even the king, bigot as he 
was, was constrained, in consequence of their rapidly in- 
creasing influence, to grant some concessions to the Protest- 
ants which it would have been far more agreeable to him to 
have withheld. They had rendered such essential service to 
the State as soldiers in the army of Francis I — who rewarded 
their patriotism by persecution — and had shown such marked 
courage in battle, that he was obliged, manifestly against his 
will, to recognize them as a power neither to be despised nor 
trifled with, unless a force could be employed to crush them 
out entirely. This was especially the case after the Prince of 
Conde became the acknowledged leader of the Huguenots. 
Fear, therefore, far more than the spirit of toleration, influ- 



2 Daurignac, Vol. I, pp. 103-104. 3 Ibid., p. 104. 



THE STRUGGLE FOR FRANCE. 101 

enced the king in conceding to the Protestants the rights of 
citizenship, which he so grudgingly granted that his conces- 
sion was almost a denial. That which was considered the 
most valuable was the allowance to the Protestants of the 
right to assemble in open conference at Poissy, and to con- 
sider and discuss such matters as pertained to their own in- 
terests and religious opinions. The sincerity and honesty of 
their religious convictions inspired them with the belief that 
if they could ever be submitted to the arbitrament of reason, 
they would, if not fully justified, be found entitled to legal 
protection in the open profession of them. On this account 
they considered the conference at Poissy as a favorable omen, 
and hailed its assembling with satisfaction. Their flattering 
anticipations, however, were not realized. It was not in- 
tended that reason and argument should avail anything in 
the presence of the only "legitimate authority" — that of 
Church and State ; and the Jesuits were standing ready and 
filled with the most anxious solicitude to demonstrate that 
the highest duty of life consisted of "uninquiring obedi- 
ence" — the closing of every avenue through which the light 
could reach the minds and consciences of the multitude. 
Evidences of this are found in what transpired at Poissy, 
where, for the first time in the history of France, the general 
of the Jesuits was allowed to appear in a public assemblage 
as the representative of the order, and to suppress any in- 
quiry whatsoever into the matters which the conference was 
especially appointed to consider, except by ecclesiastics. 
From that time forward the Protestants were reminded at 
every step they took that the sleepless eyes of the Jesuits 
were constantly upon them, ready to drive them to their 
hiding-places, turn them over to the Inquisition, or hunt 
them, with tireless vigilance, to the point of entire exter- 
mination. 

Referring to the conference at Poissy, and the liberality 
indicated toward the Protestants by the king when he con- 
sented that they should attend it, Daurignac instructs hi* 
readers that the pope "beheld with pain and regret" this 



102 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

tendency toward liberalism and free religions thought; and 
that, in order to check the progress of events in that direc- 
tion, he commanded Layuez — the immediate successor of 
Loyola as general of the Jesuits — to attend the conference 
at Poissy, with the view of preventing any adjustment of 
the existing religious differences, and deferring the final de- 
termination of them until they could be decided by the 
Council of Trent. Nobody can doubt that the object of the 
pope was to bring matters into such a condition as should 
require universal obedience to the decrees of that Council, by 
persuasion if possible, but by coercion if necessary. With 
the same end in view, the court of France continued its ef- 
forts to establish the Jesuits in Paris, well understanding 
what efficient aid they would willingly render in the work of 
suppressing every tendency toward liberalism and freedom of 
religious belief. The hostility of the Parliament toward the 
Jesuits, however, was so decided and violent that it still re- 
fused to yield obedience to the royal command ; and affairs 
remained in this condition until the death of Henry II led 
to the introduction of other influences. It was then deemed 
necessary to invoke the aid of Catharine de Medicis, mother 
of the new king, Francis II, "to show a bold front against 
the incursions of heresy by at once compelling the, Parliament 
to acknowledge and receive the Jesuits." 4 It was not difficult 
to enlist the aid of Catharine, who was always ready to prom- 
ise anything either to mislead or destroy the Protestants, 
greatly preferring the latter. By her influence and author- 
ity royal orders were issued commanding the Parliament to 
ratify and register the letters-patent to the Jesuits which had 
been prepared by Henry II before his death. It should not 
be overlooked that this was an effort to force the Jesuits into 
Paris against the repeated remonstrances of Parliament, the 
universities, the leading ecclesiastical authorities of the Gal- 
lican Church, the whole body of the Gallican and Protestaut 
Christians; and, in fact, agaiust the existing laws and the 



4 Daurignac, Vol. I, p. 105. 



THE STRUGGLE FOR FRANCE. 103 

public sentiment of the people. A fact like this not only 
tends to show, but is convincing proof, that the Jesuits were 
ready to defy all these influences, aud to disregard every ex- 
isting law or custom that imposed the least restraint upon 
them, their controlling object being not only to aid the king 
and the pope in destroying the "liberties" of the Gallican 
Church and Christians, and thus subjecting France to the 
temporal domination of the papacy, but to destroy forever 
the free religious thought which Protestantism had intro- 
duced. "But," says the Jesuit Daurignac, evidently with 
regret, "the Parliament was as intractable as ever," still re- 
fusing to obey the mandate of the king, or to allow the Jes- 
uits to enter Paris. If all this opposition to the wishes of 
the Parisian people had been the result of impulse, arising 
suddenly out of rapidly passing events, it might be passed 
over as a sudden outbreak and forgotten. But it was the 
result of a fixed, settled, and determinate papal policy, which 
had already had several centuries of growth, and which it 
was deliberately resolved to persist in until the heresy of 
Protestantism should be exterminated, and free religious 
thought made impossible. Such a contest as that was most 
congenial to the Jesuits, because they saw, in the achievement 
of these results, the fulfillment of the highest objects of their 
society. With a stake like that in view, backed by the king 
and the pope, they persisted in their course with untiring 
vigilance, considering the most serious difficulties they encoun- 
tered as mere trifles compared with the end they hoped to 
reach. That they might be assured of the royal sympathy, 
the king, Francis II, was easily induced by Catharine de 
Medicis to issue "new letters-patent, with orders for their 
immediate enrollment by Parliament, notwithstanding the 
remonstrances of the assembly and of the Bishop of Paris." 5 
But Parliament, still unyielding, submitted them to the four 
Faculties of the university, " thus indicating," says Daurignac, 
"a disposition 'not to submit even to the authority ofroyalty,'" 



5 Daurignac, Vol. I, p. 105. 



104 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

a most grievous offense, which, in those days, was considered a 
flagrant sin. The conclusion of the four Faculties was that the 
Jesuits were "inadmissible," based upon satisfactory reasons 
which were fully assigned. This obstinacy was unpardonable, 
and, inasmuch as it could not be overcome by direct means, the 
Jesuits, at last, were driven to the necessity of resorting to 
indirection, manifestly intending, if thereby successful, to 
regain whatsoever ground they might be compelled to lose. 
Accordingly they changed their tactics, and in order to re- 
move the existing obstacles, declared, in a petition to the 
king, that if admitted into Paris they would conform to the 
laws of the country, and " to the Church of France," a pur- 
pose they had never avowed before, and which subsequent 
events proved they did not then intend to fulfill. But the 
Parliament was not entrapped by this Jesuitical device, and, 
in response, proposed to the king that they would withdraw 
their objection to the Jesuits upon the condition that they 
should cease " to apply to the society the name of Jesus; 
and that, moreover, they should not be considered as a relig- 
ious order in the diocese of Paris, but be designated simply 
as members of a society," 6 with civil rights exclusively. 
This probably was a mere subterfuge, inasmuch as the Jesuits 
could not have consented to the proposition without self- 
destruction. It shows, however, how intense was the oppo- 
sition to the society. 

The whole Christian population of Paris, including both 
the Gallicans and Protestants, were thrown into a condition of 
intense excitement when Charles IX ascended the throne as 
the successor of Francis II. The Protestants were in fear of 
total extermination ; and the Gallican Christians were con- 
vinced that the main object of the Jesuits, the pope, and 
the monarchical rulers of the country, was to change the 
destiny of France by bringing the country into humiliating 
obedience to Rome, both in religious and temporal affairs, 
without any regard whatsoever to their system of Church 



6 Dauriguac, Vol. I, p. 10G. 



THE STRUGGLE FOR FRANCE. 105 

government, or to the integrity of their ancient Christian 
faith. Charles IX was a mere child, only nine years of age, 
and was, consequently, the mere creature of his mother, Cath- 
arine de Medicis, whose familiarity with court intrigues en- 
abled her, as guardian of the king, to grasp all the powers of 
queen regent, without reference to the sentiments or will of 
the French people. She relied solely upon the possession of 
the powers and prerogatives of royalty to maintain her 
authority; and, being an Italian, her character resembled as 
nearly that of the prince portrayed by Mackiavelli, her 
countryman, as that of any other ruler who ever governed. 
She was always profuse in her promises when she considered 
them necessary to gain her objects; but never regarded her- 
self bound by them beyond her own pleasure. She violated 
them at will, whensoever her royal or personal interests re- 
quired it. In her dealings with the French Huguenots 
she practiced treachery and perfidy to an extent which 
would have brought a blush to the cheek of a Turkish sul- 
tan. She was, therefore, a fit instrument in the hands of 
the papal authorities and the Jesuits to bring France and the 
French Christians in subjugation to Rome — an object which, 
as an Italian and foreigner, was especially attractive to her. 
She caused the king to yield, or readily yielded herself, as 
the king had no will of his own, to the entreaties of the 
Jesuits by again requiring of Parliament that it should con- 
sent to their establishment in Paris without further delay. 
But the Jesuits were still so obnoxious that Parliament con- 
tinued to hesitate, and demanded an explanation of the rea- 
sons for a step of such doubtful propriety, and so in conflict 
with public opinion. In explanation, one of the leading 
Jesuits, with "much eloquence," it is said by Daurignac, 
"clearly and energetically exposed the plans and projects of 
the Calvinists," or Protestants, and "the machinations and 
collusions existing between them and the university for the 
purpose of obtaining their ends ;" that is, their united efforts 
to establish in France the freedom of religious belief — a form 
of heresy which the disciples of Loyola had solemnly sworn 



106 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

to eradicate. This open avowal of the only motive which 
influenced the Jesuits surrounded the controversy with so 
much delicacy and importance, that it was referred by the 
Parliament to the States General, as the representative of 
the whole nation, or to the next National Council of the 
Church. Thus we find constantly accumulating the most 
conclusive evidence to show the persistence of the Jesuits, 
and how steadily and earnestly they were resisted by the best 
and most enlightened part of the French people. 

The Jesuits were unquestionably much discomfited and 
chagrined at this continued resistance, and were constrained 
to seek assistance from every available quarter. The nobility 
of Auvergne were consequently persuaded to interpose in 
their behalf by soliciting the admission of the society into 
all the towns of that province, evidently supposing if that 
were done that the Jesuits would soon diffuse themselves 
throughout the whole country. That the entire destruction 
of Protestantism was the only and ultimate end they con- 
templated is sufficiently proven by the fact that in their 
petition to the king, wherein they asked for the introduction 
of the Jesuits, they said: " Unless the king wishes the whole 
of Auvergne to fall into heresy, it is necessary that the So- 
ciety of Jesus should be admitted into France." 7 

These proceedings w r ere soon followed by the National 
Council of the French Church at Poissy, to which, as we 
have seen, the Protestants had looked forward with so much 
anxiety, anticipating it as an occasion when they would be 
permitted to make known the reasons of their religious be- 
lief. It was attended by the queen regent, the king, and 
the entire royal court, representing monarchical power; by 
five cardinals, forty archbishops and bishops, and numerous 
doctors, in behalf of the Church ; by several Calviuist min- 
isters, representing that form of faith; and by Henry, King 
of Navarre, and the Prince of Conde, representing the Hu- 
guenots and the general Protestant sentiment in favor of 



7 Daurignac, Vol. I, p. 107. 



THE STRUGGLE FOR FRANCE. 107 

religious liberty. Such a body, under ordinary circum- 
stances, might have enabled the Protestants to realize their 
hopes, at least to the extent of convincing the authorities of 
the Government that they were loyal to it, and obedient to 
all its commands, except in the single particular of desiring 
to be left free to follow their own consciences in the worship 
of God. But Laynez, the Jesuit general, was also there, to 
demand conformity to the requirements of the papacy and of 
his society, that no discussion should be tolerated, and that 
" uninquiring obedience" to authority should be exacted from 
all. To him and to his society it was impossible to preserve 
the union of Church and State without this; and if this were 
not done, its joint monarchism would be endangered. Ac- 
cordingly he took especial pains to point out to the king and 
queen-mother "the indecency and danger" of the free dis- 
cussion of questions of religious faith, by those who were 
disposed to defend Protestantism, in such an assembly. 
Daurignac says that Laynez was "shocked and grieved by 
the fearful blasphemies which had fallen from the lips of 
one Peter Martyr, an apostate monk," who had ventured to 
express his opinions freely. He considered it improper for 
any but theologians — that is, those whose minds had been 
already molded and fashioned to obedience — to be present 
upon such occasions. This rebuke offended the queen- 
mother, who withdrew from the Council. But this did not 
disconcert the Jesuit general, who was not so easily turned 
from his purpose. He knew the character of her majesty 
thoroughly, and said to the Prince of Conde, "She is a great 
dissembler," believing, as he undoubtedly did, that whatso- 
ever she might then do or say, he would, in the end, bring 
her into obedience to the Jesuit purposes. He soon had 
convincing proof of his power; for the queen, the king, and 
the nobles never afterwards appeared in the .Council, and 
the Jesuit general had the matter in his own hands. 8 In- 
stead of bringing the conference to any practical results, 



s Daurignac, Vol. I, pp. 108-109. 



108 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

favorable in the least degree to freedom of conscience, Laynez 
succeeded in causing it to contribute to measures having 
reference to the admission of the Jesuits into all parts of 
France. 9 The Protestants were dismayed, and the Jesuits 
were triumphant. Laynez then became the leader of the 
orthodox party, and from that time commanded an influence 
which Loyola himself did not acquire. We shall see here- 
after how far-reaching and controlling this influence was. 

After Laynez left the Council at Poissy, flushed with tri- 
umph, he repaired at once to the General Council of Trent, 
which was then in session, as a special legate of the pope — 
Pius IV — who had discovered in him such qualities as he 
supposed might become available in helping the sinking for- 
tunes of the papacy. This was the first appearance of a 
Jesuit general in such a body, or in other general ecclesias- 
tical assemblages, and consequently dates the beginning of a 
new era in the history of the Roman Church. Christianity 
had prevailed for more than fifteen hundred years without 
the aid of such a society as the Jesuits; but as that wonder- 
ful organization had been conceived by the restless brain of 
Loyola for the sole purpose of suppressing the Reformation 
and all its enlightening influences, it was readily accepted 
by the papal authorities as a valuable help, .after the pope 
had given it his indorsement. Hence, Laynez was received 
by the Council of Trent with unusual manifestations of joy 
and enthusiasm. The prelates of the Council had undoubt- 
edly been notified of his success at Poissy in obtaining the 
mastery over Catharine de Medicis, and, through her, over 
the king and court of France, as well as over the Protest- 
ants. Preference was shown him over all the representa- 
tives of the ancient religious orders of the Church, and when 
the latter complained of this, upon the ground that the 
Jesuit society was only of recent origin, the Council decided 
against them on account of the important services which the 
Jesuits, by means of their compact organization, would be 



9 Church in France. By Jervis. Vol. I, p. 146. 



THE STRUGGLE FOR FRANCE. 109 

able to render the cause of the papacy. And to manifest 
this preference of the Jesuits over the other orders, so that 
it could not be mistaken, a pulpit was prepared for Laynez 
in a conspicuous place in the Council chamber, so that what- 
soever he said should be distinctly heard. 10 The monastic 
orders were not satisfied with the inferior position thus as- 
signed to them, and murmured, but could not help it. 

Such a reception as this by so distinguished a body of 
prelates as the Council of Trent, was well calculated to incite 
the pride and ambition of the Jesuits — especially of Laynez — 
and to create in their minds the belief that if they continued 
to pursue the cautious but aggressive policy of Loyola, they 
would bring the pope and all the ecclesiastical authorities of 
the Church into obedience to them. Manifestly, the society 
considered this the ultimate end contemplated by Loyola; 
and Laynez was sufficiently skilled in the methods of gov- 
ernment to understand the necessity of obtaining from the 
Council of Trent the recognition of the superiority of the 
Jesuits over the monastic orders. He had not yet succeeded 
in accomplishing the admission of the society into France, 
and this he evidently regarded as an important step in that 
direction. Flattering as was his reception by the Council, it 
was not all he desired. He considered an additional step 
necessary to obtain from the Council a full approval of the 
reasons assigned by Loyola to justify the establishment of 
his society. Accordingly, after the Council had passed upon 
the questions of faith and dogma, it proceeded to investi- 
gate "the causes of the evils which afflicted the Church." 
This opened an exceedingly broad field of inquiry, and re- 
sulted, doubtless as Laynez desired, in the conclusion stated 
by Daurignac, " that these causes were, principally, the 
ignorance and immorality of a great portion of the clergy 
and the monastic orders," and that " the best remedy for this 
great evil was to prepare Christian generations by a good 
system of education ;" n that is to say, that any effort to re- 



10 Daurignac, Yol. I, pp. 111-112. » Ibid., p. 114. 



110 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

form the existing clergy and ancient orders would be un- 
availing, but that the remedy lay in educating other and 
future generations. It is easy to see that this conclusion 
was unavoidable under the doctrine established by the same 
Council, and affirmed also by the Jesuits, that the clergy 
who lead virtuous and those who lead vicious lives, possess 
the same power and authority in the Church. 

This was a great triumph for Laynez and his society, in- 
asmuch as it was a specific approval by the Council of Trent 
of the grounds upon which Loyola had justified the creation 
of the Jesuit society; that is, the incompetency of the Church 
to reform itself without extraneous aid, apart from the exist- 
ing clergy and the monastic orders, and the necessity for an 
educational organization, like that of the Jesuits, to be 
maintained by authority and discipline for that purpose. 12 
And thus equipped by so important an indorsement, the 
Jesuits at once assumed to have been constituted, with Divine 
approval, the exclusive educators of the world, and to be 
endowed with authority to enter every nation at will, and 
so to train and discipline the "Christian generations" as to 
bring them down to a common level of obedience to the 
united authority of Church and State. 

Without the indorsement obtained by the Jesuits from 
the Council of Trent, they might have been kept out of 
Paris entirely, or, at all events, their entry into that city 
would have been greatly delayed. As it was, the autipathy 
against them remained so great and universal among the 
Gallican Christians, that their admission at last was obtained 
only upon the condition that they should take a solemn oath 
to do nothing to impair the liberties of the Gallican Church; 
that they would submit to the laws of the nation, which rec- 
ognized the pope as the head of the Church, but denied to 
him the power to excommunicate the king ; or to lay an in- 
terdict upon the kingdom ; or to exercise any jurisdiction 
over temporal matters; or to dismiss bishops from their 



12 Daurignac, Vol. I ,pp. 177-178. 



THE S TR UG GLE FOR FRANCE. HI 

office; or to exercise any authority by a legate, unless em- 
powered by the king; and that they would, moreover, 
maintain those provisions of law which assigned to a General 
Council of the Church power superior to that of a pope — in 
other words, that papal infallibility was not a part of Chris- 
tian faith. 13 There is abundant reason for believing, in 
view of both preceding and subsequent events, that when 
the Jesuits took this oath, they had not the least idea of 
being bound by it. No Jesuit's conscience was ever bound 
by such an oath. 

The authority of Laynez, under the circumstances re- 
lated, became potential enough to enable him to influence 
the decisions of the queen-mother and the court of France, 
and finding himself thus sustained, it was not long before 
the Jesuit policy began to bear its legitimate fruits. Of 
course, his most heavily charged batteries were immediately 
opened upon the Protestants, to whose heresies he traced all 
the existing evils of the times. An occasion for this soon 
occurred. The Protestants petitioned for "places of wor- 
ship ;" that is, merely to be allowed to worship at designated 
places according to their consciences. Laynez fully under- 
stood the meaning of this, and the ends it would ultimately 
accomplish if the Protestant petition were allowed. His 
keen sagacity enabled him to know that if the differences 
between Protestantism and the papacy became the subject of 
intellectual discussion, upon a iorum where human reason 
had the right to assert itself, the triumph of the former over 
the latter would be assured. Therefore, true to his own in- 
stincts and the teachings of his society, he remonstrated with 
Catharine de Medicis against granting the prayer of the 
Protestants, and in his memorial upon the subject " pointed 
out to her so forcibly the danger to the Church and State 
that such a concession would entail, that, appreciating his 
arguments, she refused to sanction the erection of Protest- 
ant places of worship." u 



1 3 Nicolini, pp, 177-178, i* Daurignac, Vol. I, p. 110. 



112 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

These facts — related upon Jesuit authority, and boasted 
of by their historians — furnish the most palpable and incon- 
testable proof of the conspiracy of Catharine de Medicis and 
the Jesuits, after the latter obtained admission into France, 
to suppress the freedom of religious worship, and so to mold 
the policy of Church and State as to render its existence im- 
possible. It was an odious and revolting conspiracy; but 
the objects to be accomplished justified it in the eyes of the 
queen, of Laynez, and of all his followers. It was the car- 
dinal point of the professed Jesuit policy — the most promi- 
nent feature of their organization. No imagination is fertile 
enough to picture the condition into which the civilized 
world would have been plunged if this conspiracy, besides its 
temporary and bloody triumph in France, had become suffi- 
ciently powerful to dictate the Governments of modern States. 
The Gallican Christians had for centuries successfully re- 
sisted all attempts of the papacy to interfere with the tem- 
poral affairs of France; and whilst they disagreed with Prot- 
estants upon questions of religious faith, the two forces were 
united in opposition to the Jesuits, because of the direct hos- 
tility of the latter to both. Each could see that the entrance 
of the society into France, under the control and dominion 
of an alien power, would be the introduction of a disturbing 
and hostile element, which would put an end to the concord 
and harmony then rapidly springing up between the two 
Christian bodies. This the Jesuits intended to prevent by 
whatsoever means they could manage to employ ; for, from 
the beginning of their existence, they have opposed every- 
thing they could not subjugate. Therefore they realized the 
importance of having the monarchical power upon their 
side — especially when they saw it wielded by such a queen 
as Catharine de Medicis — so that by conspiracy with it against 
the Gallican Christians and the Protestants, they could de- 
stroy the liberties of the former, and entirely suppress the 
spirit of free inquiry asserted by the latter. Keeping these 
objects always before them, the Jesuits considered them of 
sufficient magnitude to justify any form of intrigue; and 



THE STRUGGLE FOR FRANCE. 113 

they were sufficiently familiar with the qualities of the queen 
to know that she possessed such love of power and capacity 
for conspiracy that they could successfully play upon her 
ambition and prejudices to accomplish their purposes. 

There is no intelligent reader of French history who is 
not familiar with the steps taken by this perfidious queen 
regent, after the admission of the Jesuits into Paris, to bring 
about the terrible Massacre of St. Bartholomew — an event 
so closely allied with others, of which they were the un- 
doubted authors, that one must close his eyes not to see the 
evidences which point to their agency in that infamous trans- 
action. They needed such bloody work to give them the 
mastery over France; and although they have since then 
been more than once expelled in disgrace from French soil, 
they have returned again and again to torment her people, 
who still continue to realize, under their Republic, how un- 
ceasingly they labor for the entire overthrow of every form 
of popular government. 

8 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE SOCIETY ENTERS GERMANY. 

The Jesuits encountered less difficulty in establishing them- 
selves in Germany than in either Spain, Portugal, or France. 
Race differences may have occasioned this. The populations 
resting upon the shores of the Mediterranean and the At- 
lantic descended from the early Celts, and became readily 
Latinized. They accepted the traditionary religion of Rome; 
knew comparatively little of the Bible, which was a sealed 
book to them; and received their Christian faith only from 
the Roman clergy. There was no word in any of their lan- 
guages which signified liberty in the sense of a right derived 
from the law of nature. With them, liberty conveyed the 
idea of a franchise, granted by authority, and subject to be 
withdrawn at pleasure. Hence they yielded implicit obedi- 
ence to Rome, and accepted it as consistent with the Divine 
will that no other than the Romish religion should be reco£- 
nized or tolerated, and that force might be justifiably em- 
ployed to suppress all others when it was deemed necessary 
to do so. Consequently they were inclined at first to resist — 
or, at least, to look suspiciously upon — the Jesuits, inasmuch 
as Loyola had declared it to be the controlling reason for the 
creation of the society that the ancient monastic orders and 
the clergy had by their vices endangered the Church. This 
seemed heretical, and therefore they practiced towards him 
and his followers at first their accustomed intolerance. They 
preferred the old system, to which they had become accus- 
tomed, to anything new, with regard either to the Church or 
the faith. Accordingly we find that among the Latin pop- 
ulations the influence of the pope became necessary to the 
114 



THE SOCIETY ENTERS GERMANY. 115 

admission and establishment of the Jesuit society. They 
yielded only to his authority, because they regarded disobedi- 
ence of him as heresy. 

It was otherwise with the Germans. As the descendants 
of the old Teutons, they had some conceptions of natural lib- 
erty, and had indicated a desire for popular government by 
the election of their kings. The Scriptures had been placed 
in their hands as early as the fourth, century, when Bishop 
Ulfilas translated the Gospels and part of the Old Testament 
into the Gothic language, thereby making them accessible to 
the people, and stimulating the desire to read and under- 
stand them. This created a sense of individuality, which 
soon became more diffused than elsewhere in Europe, thus 
making the Germans an intelligent and tolerant race. Their 
tolerance, therefore, when the Jesuits appeared, prevented 
any popular commotion. By that time the influences of the 
Reformation had become greatly extended, and had im- 
pressed the minds of a large number of the German people. 
Protestantism had become established, and the population 
was divided into two religious parties — Roman Catholic and 
Protestant. But these parties, influenced towards each 
other by the old Teutonic liberality and tolerance, lived to- 
gether in perfect peace and harmony, each maintaining its 
own religious faith and worship without interference by the 
other. There were also divisions among the Protestants — 
some being the followers of Luther, and others of Calvin. 
But there was no religious strife between Roman Catholics 
and Protestants. According to the German custom of that 
period, there were earnest disputations about doctrines, but 
no tumult — nothing to disturb the quiet of society. Perse- 
cution on account of religious differences was entirely un- 
known ; a persecutor would have been considered a public 
enemy. The true spirit of Christianity prevailed — the natural 
consequence of the same form of religions liberty provided 
for by the institutions of the United States, and which might 
now exist throughout the Christian world, but for the bane- 



116 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

ful influences of Jesuitism. The Venetian ambassador, then 
in Germany, thus describes the peaceful condition of the 
German Christians : 

"One party has accustomed itself to put up with the 
other so well, that, in any place where there happens to be 
a mixed population, little or no notice is taken as to whether 
a person is a Catholic or Protestant. Not only villages, but 
even families, are in this manner mixed up together, and 
there even exist houses where the children belong to one 
persuasion while the parents belong to the other, and where 
brothers adhere to opposite creeds. Catholics and Protest- 
ants, indeed, intermarry with each other, and no one takes 
any notice of the circumstance, or offers any opposition 
thereto." 1 

The German author to whom we are indebted for the 
above extract says, in addition, "Even many princes of the 
Catholic Church in Germany went even a step further, and 
apj)ointed men who were thorough Protestants to situations 
at their courts as counselors, judges, magistrates, or whatever 
other office it might be, without any opposition or objection 
being offered thereto." And these, he adds in a note, " were 
not at all exceptional cases." 2 

Notwithstanding Germany was enjoying this state of 
calm and repose, under the influence of that religious toler- 
ation which is the natural outgrowth of all the teachings of 
Christ, and has the full sanction of his example, it afforded 
neither pleasure nor satisfaction to the ecclesiastical support- 
ers of the papacy at Rome. They saw in it the threatened 
destruction of the papal system, and the ruin of their ambi- 
tious hopes, unless, by some means, this spirit of religious 
toleration and liberalism could be entirely extirpated. They 
regarded Protestantism and the liberty which gave birth to 
it as heretical, as the worst and most flagrant violations of 
God's law. How to put an end to this liberty, and destroy 



1 History of the Jesuits. By Greisinger. Page 213. 

2 Ibid., p. 213, note *. 



THE SOCIETY ENTERS GERMANY. 117 

all its fruits, was the practical question which agitated the 
mind of the pope. He was willing enough to imitate the 
example of Innocent III in his treatment of the Albigenses, 
by beginning the work of persecution in Germany, and turn- 
ing over the Protestants to the Inquisition, for that would 
have conformed to the Canon law. But there were difficul- 
ties in the way not easily overcome. The Inquisition was 
not likely to carry on its murderous work as successfully in 
Germany as among the Latin races trained to obedience. 
The Germans were not so docile and submissive. And, be- 
sides, the influences of the Reformation, under the impulse 
given them by the courageous example of Luther, had 
reached some of the most powerful princes in Germany, who 
would have stood as a strong wall of protection against all 
such assaults. They were not willing to obey the pontifical 
command when it required that papal emissaries should be 
allowed at pleasure to burn their own subjects at the stake, 
and desolate their homes. Excommunication had nearly 
run its course. It had been so frequently employed to pro- 
mote the personal ambition of popes, and for trifling and 
temporal purposes, that it was fast coming into disrepute. 
Its influence was so impaired that it had, in a large degree, 
lost its effectiveness. Protestant Churches could not be 
closed by edicts of interdict. The attempt to release the 
German people from allegiance to their princes, would have 
been as ineffectual as the command of King Canute when he 
ordered the waves of the ocean to retire. Any form of 
papal malediction and anathema would have been unavailing. 
Howsoever sick at heart the pope may have been at this 
prospect so fatal to his ambition, he was not reduced to en- 
tire despair. He did not abandon the hope of bringing 
back the German princes to the old religion, and employing 
them as secular aids in such measures of coercion as should 
be found necessary to reduce the people into obedience. He 
found the old ecclesiastical weapons somewhat blunted, and 
looked around for others. Fortune seemed, at last, to smile 
upon the pope when, casting his eyes around, they rested 



118 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

upon the Jesuits — the freshly enlisted " militia of the 
Church " — who, without any sense of either pride or shame, 
were trained to implicit obedience, without stopping to in- 
quire whether the work required of them was good or bad, 
noble or ignoble. Called upon by the pope, probably at the 
suggestion of Loyola himself, the Jesuits were as ready to 
obey as the latter was to command, even to the extent of 
conspiring against the peace of Germany, or any other 
country where barriers had been constructed to protect 
society against aggression. But the method of procedure was 
by no means clear. Courageous as Loyola was, he could not 
venture to send his small army into Germany with an open dis- 
play of the instruments of persecution in their hands. They 
could not go as the open defenders of the papal dogmas, for 
they were unable to speak or understand the German lan- 
guage. If they had even been able to make known their 
opinions and purposes, they could not have withstood the 
intense indignation and fiery eloquence of the disciples of 
Luther and Calvin. The occasion, therefore, demanded of 
Loyola the exercise of his keen penetration — of that wonder- 
ful sagacity which never deserted him, and which, at his 
death, he succeeded in imparting to his successor. The 
manner of procedure he finally adopted is suggestive of 
serious reflection, especially to the people of the United 
States. 

If it be true that " history repeats itself," and that nations, 
moving in fixed cycles, follow each other in their courses, 
the remembrance of the fact that many of them, once pros- 
perous, have passed out of existence, admonishes us to in- 
quire with exceeding caution into the relations which these 
same Jesuits have created between themselves and our insti- 
tutions. They have not changed, but are still the infatuated 
and vindictive followers of Loyola, and it is well for us to 
know whether there are not evidences that, if permitted, 
they may repeat here what their society, at the command of 
its founder, attempted in Germany, under the pretense that 
God had appointed them to conspire against any free and 



THE SOCIETY ENTERS GERMANY. 119 

independent nation they could not otherwise subjugate. 
The people of the United States spend their time in the pur- 
suit of a thousand objects, and in the investigation of a 
thousand questions, not the thousandth part as important to 
them as this. 

Military men have long been accustomed to reserve sap- 
pers and miners as helps in the emergencies of war. These 
always attack under cover, approaching by slow and stealthy 
degrees, like the tiger or the cat. They do not take the 
chances of actual conflict, and never expose themselves to 
the leaden bail of battle. When the walls of a fortress can 
not be battered down by direct assault, they secretly under- 
mine them ; and when the fuse is lighted, the magazine ex- 
ploded, and the dead scattered in all directions, they return 
to their hiding-places unharmed, to share in the rewards of 
victory. 

Loyola was a skillful and courageous soldier, perfectly 
familiar with all the plans and strategies of war. In the or- 
ganization of his society, he had availed himself of his knowl- 
edge both of the motives of men and of the movements of 
armies. Hence, when he submitted to the popehis proposed 
methods of operation, he took the precaution to impress him 
with its importance and necessity, by declaring that, as its 
head, he should consider himself "as the representative of 
Christ, the commander-in-chief of the heavenly hosts," and 
as engaged in "the war service of Christ," with an army 
bound by solemn oaths to obey him implicitly "in every 
particular, and on all occasions." 3 Hence, also, speaking of 
his society, he said : " We must be always ready to advance 
against the enemy, and be always prepared to harass him or 
to fall upon him, and on that account we must not venture to 
tie ourselves to any particular place ;" 4 that is, that Jesuits 
must secretly skulk about over the world, without habita- 
tions or homes, and, paying no allegiance to any opposing 
authority, to "harass" Protestants wheresoever they are 



3 Greisinger, p. 48, etc. 4 Ibid., p. 63. 



120 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

found — like freebooters upon the sea — leaving no tracks be- 
hind them. 

The "chief thing" with the Jesuits, says Greisinger, was 
to obtain the sole direction of education, so that by getting the 
young into their hands, they could fashion theru after their 
own pattern, and, by holding them down to the low standard 
of passive and " uninquiring obedience," fit them to become 
subservient slaves of monarchical and papal power. Nobody 
need be told the impressible character of the youthful mind, 
or how the stamp made upon it becomes indelible. Loyola 
understood this, and, realizing the impossibility of arresting 
the progressive advancement of Germany under Protestant 
influences, or to uproot the tolerant spirit that prevailed 
there among both Protestants and Roman Catholics, by any 
of the usual methods of papal coercion, he insidiously 
planned the scheme of bringing Germany back to papal 
obedience by Jesuitical training in the German schools. The 
process was slow, it is true, but the stake was great ; and no 
man could have known better than he how surely it would 
be won, if the minds of the young could be cramped and 
dwarfed by Jesuit teaching. 

In the Jesuit seminaries and schools, at the period here 
referred to, the Latin language — being the language of the 
Church — grammar, and rhetoric were taught, preparatory to 
a college course, which last was confined to philosophy and 
theology. The latter was regarded as the most important, 
because it culminated in obedience to papal authority, and 
was centered in the idea that it was impossible to reach 
heaven by any other methods than those prescribed by the 
Roman Church. Of course, no education could be per- 
fected, in the estimation of the Jesuits, that did not conform 
to their own standard by requiring the pupils to surrender 
their manhood into the keeping of their superiors, as they had 
done themselves, and thereby become pieces of human ma- 
chinery, to be moved about at the will and pleasure of those 
whom they were taught to regard as God's vicegerents upon 
earth. No matter where Jesuit colleges or schools have ex 



THE SOCIETY ENTERS GERMANY. 121 

isted, or yet exist, this has always been the primary and 
chief object and end of the education furnished by them. 
When it stops short of this, it is a failure; but when this 
object is accomplished, the society exultingly adds its fresh 
recruits to the papal militia, to be marshaled against Prot- 
estantism, enlightenment, and popular government, under 
commanders who never tolerate disobedience. 

Pope Julius III — successor of Paul III — in aid of the 
conspiracy against Germany, granted an extension of the 
privileges originally conferred upon the Jesuits, and, at the 
suggestion of Loyola, authorized him to establish a German 
college (Collegium Germanieuiri) in Rome. The object of this 
was, not to teach the German language to the Spanish, 
French, and Italian pupils then being educated in Rome in 
the Collegium Bomanum, but to procure German youths to 
be taught there under Jesuit auspices and the patronage of 
the pope, so that upon their return home they would dis- 
seminate Jesuit opinions and influences among the people, 
and thus arrest the progress of Protestantism, and put an 
end to the religious toleration prevailing among the Protest- 
ant and Roman Catholic Germans. In execution of this 
purpose, steps were at once taken to procure from Germany 
some young men, to be brought to Rome and put in train- 
ing for the ecclesiastical subjugation of their countrymen. 
That such was the sole object will not be doubted by any 
intelligent investigator of the facts. Germany was well sup- 
plied with colleges and schools, where the standard of edu- 
cation was higher than at Rome ; but they were under Prot- 
estant management and control, and therefore considered 
heretical. It was the odious form of heresy embodied in 
Protestantism that Loyola and his followers were sworn to 
exterminate, and these young Germans were carried to Rome 
that they might be disciplined and educated for that pur- 
pose — to undermine the institutions of their own country! 
Have the Jesuits ever changed their purpose to make the 
extermination of Protestantism a leading and central feature 
of their educational system? Have they abandoned any of 



122 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the methods employed by Loyola himself for that purpose? 
We shall see as our investigations proceed. 

But the institution of a Jesuit college at Rome was not 
the only means employed, inasmuch as more immediate and 
active measures were considered necessary. Therefore, whilst 
that was left to bear its fruits at a later period, the Jesuits 
sent into Germany some of their prudent and sagacious 
members, such as they supposed would be likely to exercise 
influence over the princes, so that through them the whole 
German population might be reached. These princes were 
the acknowledged representatives of monarchism, and it was 
believed that if they could be persuaded to accept the Jesuit 
emissaries as their allies, the usual methods of papal com- 
pulsion could be employed with impunity. In this the 
Jesuits calculated sagaciously, and were enabled to establish 
several colleges in Germany, and ultimately to begin an open 
and direct war upon Protestantism. They did not invoke 
the aid of reason. They neither invited nor allowed calm 
discussion with learned Protestant theologians, but relied en- 
tirely upon the united authority of the pope and the princes — 
that is, upon monarchical power. Finding the Lutherans 
and the Calvinists divided upon theological questions, they 
availed themselves of every opportunity to incite them to 
mutual strife, insisting, as they have ever since continued 
to do, that there can be but one true form of Christian faith, 
which every human being is obliged to accept, or to offend 
God. Seemingly insensible to the fact that the Creator has 
made the minds of men to differ as their faces and features, 
they were sagacious enough to know that differences of opin- 
ion upon religious as upon all other subjects could be pre- 
vented only by force and coercion. Therefore, to compel 
uniformity of faith and to uproot Protestantism, they per- 
suaded some of the princes, especially those of Bavaria, to 
believe that the principle of monarchy was endangered, and 
would be entirely destroyed, if the influences of the Ref- 
ormation were not obliterated. That such was, and yet 
is, the natural effect of these influences is true; and there- 



THE SOCIETY ENTERS GERMANY. 123 

fore, as these princes could easily see that, if popular institu- 
tions were established in Germany, their princely occupations 
would be threatened, they became the willing tools of the 
Jesuits. The Duke of Bavaria was one of the most sub- 
missive, as he was the most willing to become a persecutor. 
He had been educated by the Jesuits, and consequently was 
soon induced to exhibit " the utmost earnestness" in adopt- 
ing measures for destroying all the influences of the Reforma- 
tion, and putting an end to Protestantism. 5 He was re- 
solved, says Nicolini, "not to leave a vestige of those new 
doctrines which, for the last forty years, had been spreading 
so fast in his kingdom." Neither he nor the Jesuits made 
the least disguise of the fact that all their efforts w r ere di- 
rected to the single object of preventing the freedom of re- 
ligious belief. His first step to this end was to require that 
the Profession of Faith prescribed by the Council of Trent 
should be subscribed and adhered to; that is, that Protest- 
ants should renounce the religion which their consciences 
approved, and accept that which their consciences did not 
approve. That the people might be brought into obedience 
and forced to this, "he sent through all the provinces swarms 
of Jesuits, accompauied by bands of troopers, whose bayonets 
came to the aid of the preachers when their eloquence was 
unsuccessful in converting the heretics" — that is, the Prot- 
estants. Those who remained unsubdued were expelled from 
their estates. Prohibited books were seized and burned. 
All the ancient practices were revived. And, "above all," 
says Ranke, "the Jesuit institutions were promoted; for by 
their agency it was, that the youth of Bavaria were to be 
educated in a spirit of strict orthodoxy" — which meant then, 
what with the Jesuits it still means, opposition to religious 
freedom. 

For a time the Jesuits were restrained in Austria by 
Ferdinand T and Maximilian; but during the reign of Ru- 

5 History of the Popes. By Eanke. Book V, p. 172, etc. Lea and 
Blanckard's edition. Nicolini, p. 199. Greisinger, p. 211, etc. His- 
tory of Germany. By Lewis. Chap, xvii, p. 398, etc. 



124 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

dolph II they became bolder and more exacting. The pro- 
vincial of the society obtained great influence over Rudolph, 
and was urgent in his demands that he should extirpate 
heresy from his dominions. At last he succeeded in induc- 
ing Rudolph to inaugurate a general persecution of the 
Lutherans, and " the greatest atrocity and the utmost rigor 
were displayed in destroying every trace of Protestantism." 
The work of extirpation began in the cities. "The Re- 
formed clergy were removed, and their places filled by 
Catholic priests." A religious formula was prescribed, which 
required universal assent to the doctrine " that everything is 
true which the Church of Rome has laid down as the rule of 
life and doctrine," and that " the pope is the head of one 
Apostolic Church." The Protestants were expelled from all 
offices of State. Papists alone could become burghers. Doc- 
tors' degrees in the universities were conferred only upon 
those who subscribed to the Roman Confession of Faith. The 
Jesuit schools were governed by regulations "which pre- 
scribed Catholic formularies, fasts, worship, according to the 
Catholic Ritual," and all the pupils were taught the Jesuit 
Catechism. All Protestant books were seized and taken 
away from booksellers' shops, and all that were found in 
the custom-houses were confiscated. And the historian, sum- 
ming it all up, says : " All through Germany the same pro- 
ceedings were resorted to, and everywhere we find the 
Jesuits foremost in the reaction. There was no bishop, no 
prince, who went to visit a province upon religious con- 
cerns, who did not bring with him a troop of Jesuits, who, 
on his departure, were often left there with almost unlimited 
powers." 6 

The task of becoming familiar with the history of those 
times is formidable; but its performance will amply repay 
the careful and thoughtful student, inasmuch as the events 
which then transpired materially influenced the subsequent 



6 Nicolini, pp. 201-202. For these particulars see also Rauke, 
Griesinger, Steinmetz, and Lewis. 



THE SOCIETY ENTERS GERMANY. 125 

condition of the world. Especially did they influeDce that 
current of affairs which caused the most enlightened nations 
to drift towards religious freedom and popular government, 
the two great and inseparable factors in modern progress. At 
the period here referred to, true Christian civilization, as in- 
spired by the charity and gentleness exhibited in the life of 
Christ, seemed to hang, for a time, at equipoise in the bal- 
ance. The struggle for mastery between the light of the 
Reformation and the darkness of the Middle Ages was long 
and fierce, and occasionally doubtful. One can not fail to 
see that the spirit of liberty had been so nearly crushed out 
by the monarchism of Church and State, that it required 
the finger of Providence to point out the way to the revival 
of primitive Christianity, and the restoration of its beneficial 
influences upon the consciences and lives of the vast multi- 
tudes who had been long held in inferiority. The student 
will find the conflict instructive at every point. It will 
bring into view perfidy and treachery where there ought to 
have been confidence and fair dealiug, shameful betrayals of 
the cause of truth and justice, and the heartless sacrifice of 
many thousands of inoffensive people. It will show popes 
and kings uniting their power in the cause of oppression and 
wrong, and shamelessly practicing vices condemned equally 
by the laws of God and man. Many figures conspicuous in 
history will appear, among them that of the great Emperor 
Charles V. He will be seen procuring imperial dominion 
over a people he did not know, and whose language he could 
neither speak nor understand ; quarreling with the pope one 
day and threatening to subvert his throne, and becoming 
reconciled the next, in order that monarchism should be 
strengthened ; sending savage hordes of armed men to crush 
out the spirit of religious liberty in his native Netherlands 
by blood and murder; promising protection to the German 
Protestants in order to obtain their assistance in his war 
against the Turks, and afterwards betraying and persecuting 
them for heresy; uniting for a time with the pope against 
the king of France, and then with the king of France against 



126 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the pope ; forcing the pope to convene a General Council, 
and pretending to grant by bis famous "Interim" some 
shadowy rights to Protestants, in order that they might 
ultimately be compelled to accept the faith as the Council 
should decree ; aud at last, when his successes were turned 
into adversities and his tortuous policy involved him in dis- 
appointment, abdicating his royal authority, retiring to a 
monastery, and confiding the infamous work of persecuting 
Protestants and desolating his native land to his cold- 
blooded and murderous son. Then, as the scene shifts, 
Philip II will appear, with his vicegerent, the Duke of Alva, 
and his bloodthirsty crew, the sounds of whose warlike 
bugles were drowned by the piercing cries of their Protest- 
ant victims. Then may also be seen, passing in panoramic 
view, the whole land of the Netherlands drenched in the 
blood of innocent and persecuted Protestants; the Spanish 
and Italian Inquisitions carrying on their horrible work with 
so much activity that its machinery was never still ; France 
trembling upon the threshold of ruin, and her kings and 
queens forming leagues with the Huguenots, to be immedi- 
ately and perfidiously violated ; and Germany, torn into 
factions by the discord between princes and people which 
was born of Jesuit intrigue, offering a tempting field to the 
emissaries of the papacy, wherein usurped and illegitimate 
authority might revel whilst the "sacred militia" of Loyola 
rejoiced at the triumph they had won over Protestantism and 
free religious thought. 

Through all these courses of events the Jesuits steadily 
appeared — alike indifferent to the wounds they inflicted 
upon the Church and the agonies of their unnumbered vic- 
tims. As confessors and confidants of kings, their exertions 
to enshroud the world in the pall of monarchism were cease- 
less and untiring. They climbed into offices of state, and 
molded the temporal policy of popes and kings. They 
moved sovereigns from right to left, forward or backward, as 
children amuse themselves with toys. They exchanged the 
humble worship of the altar for the glitter of courts, as if 



THE SOCIETY ENTERS GERMANY. 127 

Christ in his life had set the example of ambitious display. 
They enrolled sovereigns and princes in the ranks of their 
defenders, and by their help drove Protestant preachers from 
their pulpits, Protestant professors and teachers from their 
colleges and schools, and Protestant people into the deepest 
depths of humiliation, by such measures of compulsion and 
repression as it must have required the inventive faculties of 
fiends to discover. All these things transpired in Europe 
during the terrible conflict between Protestantism and re- 
action. But in no other portion of the Continental States 
was the difference between the opposing forces more distinctly 
marked than in Germany, after the Jesuits, by means of 
their control of education, became enabled to check the prog- 
ress of popular enlightenment, and force the nation back 
again into the old grooves of ignorance and superstition. 

From the first entry of the Jesuits into Germany the 
peace of the country was seriously disturbed. We have 
seen how thoroughly reconciled to each other were those of 
all the shades of religious faith. Members of the Church of 
Rome and Protestants were in perfect accord upon all mat- 
ters involving the welfare of Germany, neither concerning 
themselves about the religious opinions of the other. In this 
respect it Avas as it should have been, and ought yet to be 
throughout the Christian world. And the happiness and 
progressive prosperity of Germany was assured by it, until 
the spoiler came in the form of Jesuitism, not as the bearer 
of messages of peace ancl good-will from Rome, but the vast 
progeny of evils which, in the age of fable, were supposed 
to have escaped when Pandora's jar was broken. They let 
these loose upon the land without shame or remorse, until 
society was convulsed from center to circumference, peace- 
ful homes were desolated, hearts that had rejoiced were 
broken, — all under the irreverent pretense that it was for 
" the greater glory of God !" 

Let it not be forgotten that Germany was indebted to 
Protestantism for her condition of peace and prosperity. 
We have seen that the demoralized condition of the clergy 



128 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

was employed by Loyola to justify the papal approval of his 
society, and the learned Jesuit historian, the Abbe Maynard, 
is forced to admit that when Luther gave the first impulse 
to the Re formation, " the clergy of Germany offered a sad 
example of corrupted faith and relaxed morals." He calls it 
a "mournful period," 7 notwithstanding for a thousand years 
these and other evils had been growing and spreading under 
the patronage of Rome. The papacy then dictated the 
Christianity of Germany. Mark the difference when Luther, 
Melanchthon, Bucer, and Carlstadt announced the necessity 
for reform, and put the ball of the Reformation in motion. 
The great Ranke, whose impartiality has extorted even Jesuit 
praise, when referring to the effect produced by the Refor- 
mation in Germany, says : 

"In short, from west to east and from north to south, 
throughout all Germany, Protestantism had unquestionably 
the preponderance. The nobility were attached to it from 
the very first; the body of public functionaries, already in 
those days numerous and important, was trained up in the 
new doctrine ; the common people would hear no more of 
certain articles — such, for instance, as purgatory — or of cer- 
tain ceremonies, such as the pilgrimages ; not a man durst 
come forward with holy relics. A Venetian ambassador cal- 
culates, in the year 1558, that but a tenth part of the in- 
habitants of Germany still clung to the ancient faith." 8 

Maynard also refers to this approvingly, and the Jesuits 
make it a matter of boasting, in order to support their 
claim to superior merit for having extirpated so much Prot- 
estant heresy, and for bringing back such multitudes of peo- 
ple to papal obedience. Nine Protestants to one papist! 
Germany, then, was a Protestant nation, governed by Prot- 
estant authorities, under Protestant laws, tolerant towards 
all who adhered to the ancient faith, allowing no interfer- 
ence with the freedom of religious opinions, happy, prosper- 

7 The Studies and Teachings of the Jesuits. By M. L'Ahbe' May- 
nard. Page 89. 

8 Ranke, Book V, p. 165. 



THE SOCIETY ENTERS GERMANY. 129 

ous, and free, under her own institutions. In these respects 
she was in the same condition as the United States is to-day, 
so far as she could be in the absence of written constitutional 
guarantees. 

What people upon earth, other than the Germans them- 
selves, had the just right, under the law of nations or any 
other human law, to interfere with their condition, or to 
plot, openly or secretly, against their independence? What 
was all this, however, to the pope or to the Jesuits? From 
whence did they derive the authority to form a conspiracy at 
Rome to invade Germany, overthrow her existing institu- 
tions, bind the limbs of her people with fetters they had 
already broken, to gather up the rusty iron they had cast 
away, and reforge it into manacles to hold them in obedi- 
ence to an alien and foreign power? Was this conspiracy 
commanded by the law of God ? If it was, wherein is that 
law changed? If not changed, and God's laws are all immu- 
table, may not the Jesuits of to-day enter into fresh conspir- 
acies to subvert the present institutions of Germany, or of 
Great Britain, or of the United States, or of any other nation 
that maintains the principles of Protestantism and the free- 
dom of conscience? 

These questions command the most serious thought, and 
are pregnant with considerations we are not allowed to put 
aside. Before this volume closes, answers to all of them may 
be so plainly discovered as to enable the friends of free 
thought and popular government to see wherein their great- 
est danger lies. "The Jesuits," says Banke, "conquered 
the Germans on their own soil, in their very home, and 
wrested from them a part of their native land." Will there 
not be other conquests to be achieved by them so long as the 
freedom of conscience is sheltered and guaranteed by Prot- 
estant institutions? 

9 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 

The conspiracy to overthrow the Protestant institutions 
of Germany furnished a precedent in dealing with other 
Governments. That against England was characterized by 
some peculiarities, owing to its having been subject to the 
spiritual dominion of the pope until the reign of Henry VIII, 
and afterwards under that of Mary. As there are no in- 
stances in history where a people have surrendered the con- 
trol over their institutions without a struggle, unless previ- 
ously reduced to absolute imbecility, the inauguration and 
progress of this conspiracy furnish a great many "object- 
lessons" of special interest to all in the United States who 
hold in kindly remembrance the struggles of our English an- 
cestry for liberty. 

When Henry VIII quarreled with the pope, it was only 
about his divorce. Religion was not involved.- He main- 
tained the dogmas of the Roman Catholic Church until his 
death. But in order to give license to his passions, he caused 
himself to be recognized by a submissive Parliament as taking 
the place of the pope in the religious affairs of England — 
not, however, as the head of the National Church, which did 
not distinctively exist as such until the subsequent reign of 
Edward VI. As between him and the pope, the dispute 
was about authority, not doctrine. It excited intense anger 
in the minds of both, and this was soon imparted to their 
respective adherents. Each was familiar with the methods 
of persecution and the implements of coercion, long in use 
to produce uniformity of faith, and they were equally ready 
to employ them. There were, however, differences between 
them worthy of being noted. The highest aspiration of 
130 



THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 131 

Henry was to govern England ; the pope reached out after 
the spiritual government of the world. The pope, without 
the sanction and authority of the Church, claimed personal 
infallibility; Henry did not. They were consequently formi- 
dable antagonists. Trained within the same circle of events, 
with minds disciplined by the same doctrinal teachings, and 
entirely agreed about the employment of compulsion in mat- 
ters of faith, each dealt with the other as a mere competitor 
for power. 

The pope — Paul III — endeavored to bring his royal an- 
tagonist to terms by excommunication; but Henry defied it 
and its accompanying anathemas. In proportion as the pas- 
sions of the pope became intensified by resistance to his 
spiritual authority, the measures designed to reduce England 
to obedience became more violent. Henry was denounced 
as a traitor to heaven and the Church, and threatened with 
all the consequences implied by that denunciation. The 
pope endeavored to induce the Emperor Charles V and 
Francis I of France to invade England, make conquest of 
the country, and bring it again into obedience to him; but 
these monarchs feared the consequences, and prudently de- 
clined the undertaking. Disappointed in this, the pope 
hastened to solicit the aid of Loyola, who without delay 
provided Jesuits to be sent to England as spies, and to plot 
secretly against Henry. These emissaries were privately in- 
structed by Loyola himself; and inasmuch as these instruc- 
tions have been made known, and are admitted by the 
Jesuits, they serve to show the uses to which Loyola in- 
tended to put his society. The philosophy of history is often 
left unperceived by omitting to observe the force of such evi- 
dence as this. 

After counseling them to practice great prudence and 
circumspection in conversing with others, so as to unveil 
"the depth of their sentiments" — that is, to draw out their 
secret thoughts — Loyola proceeded to instruct them that, 
"in order to conciliate to yourselves the good-will of men 
in the desire of extending the kingdom of God, you will 



132 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

make yourselves all things to all men, after the example of the 
apostle in order to gain them to Jesus Christ." And he tells 
them further that "when the devil attacks a just man, he 
does not let him see his snares" — therefore they must imi- 
tate him, in order to entice men into Jesuit snares! 1 Taken 
as a whole, these instructions were manifestly designed so to 
train all Jesuits as to make them, according to Nicolini, 
"crafty, insinuating, deceitful." Cretineau, a Jesuit, at- 
tempts to argue, continues Nicolini, that they had reference 
to religious and not to political matters, and this is the only 
defense he offers for them. But this is itself Jesuitical, in- 
asmuch as these emissaries ' were sent to England upon a 
mission involving politico-religious affairs— that is, the policy 
established by the Government of England in regard to the 
relations between it and the pope. Whether right or wrong, 
the English people established these relations for themselves, 
as they had the undoubted right to do, and no alien or for- 
eign power, whether employed by the pope or any other 
monarch, could rightfully interfere with them. 

These emissaries of Loyola and the pope visited Ireland 
and Scotland; but with the exception of intriguing with 
James V of Scotland, their mission was ineffectual, and they 
returned to Rome. Henry was not seriously disturbed by 
them. Nor was there any other attempt to introduce the 
Jesuits into England until after the death of Queen Mary, 
whose persecution of the Protestants was sufficiently satis- 
factory to the papacy without their aid. Their introduction 
during her reign had been opposed and defeated by Cardinal 
Pole, an Englishman; but whether he was hostile to them, 
or considered the existing system of persecution perfect 
enough without them, is not clearly shown. 

We are thus brought to a portion of English history 
specially interesting and instructive to all who hold in ad- 
miration the civil institutions of the United States; for they 
have read history to but little purpose who do not know how 



1 Nicolini, p. 65. Steinmetz, Vol. I, p. 302. 



THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 133 

the events of that period gave stability to principles which 
now constitute fundamental parts of our national polity. In 
tracing our pedigree back to its English source, it is as easy 
to see our intimate relations with the Elizabethan era as it is 
to follow the little rivulets in the valleys or upon the moun- 
tains in their courses to the sea. On this account some par- 
ticularity of detail is rendered necessary, or else some mat- 
ters of historic interest, not generally observed, may be 
omitted. 

During the reign of Elizabeth the papal authorities re- 
newed their exertions to put a stop to Protestantism in Eng- 
land, and sent more Jesuits there for that purpose. "These 
satellites of the pope," says the historian, "entered the 
country under fictitious names, and as stealthily as noc- 
turnal robbers, mendacious in every word they uttered, and 
exciting the people to rebellion against the 'impious' 
queen." 2 The vigilance of Elizabeth, however, was of such 
a character that she was not easily taken by surprise, and 
their plottings against her became less effective than they 
and the pope had anticipated. Accordingly other Jesuits 
were sent to Scotland to encourage Queen Mary, and hold 
her steadfast in the faith; but they were unsuccessful in the 
attempt to stir up rebellion there, and being fearful of de- 
tection and arrest, escaped out of the country as fugitives 
from justice. Nevertheless they accomplished one thing, 
which was to carry away with them several young English 
noblemen, to be educated by the Jesuits in Flanders, so as 
to fit them for treason against their own country — repeating 
in this the experiment Loyola had made in Germany. All 
these movements, although not immediately followed by any 
direct consequences, tend to show how ready the Jesuits 
were to make secret and incendiary war upon anything or 
any country upon which the pontifical curse was resting. 
And they show, moreover, their subtle methods of pro- 
cedure — how they were trained and educated in adroitness 



2 Nicolini, pp. 151, 152, note *. 



134 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

and cunning, the more easily to mislead others; how they 
raised hypocrisy and deceit up to the side of virtue; how 
they endeavored to attach to falsehood the merit which be- 
longs alone to truth; and how, in order to be ''all thiugs 
to all men," they were required to be what they were not, 
or not to be what they were, in order by deception to accom- 
plish the subjugation of Englaud to the authority of the 
pope. 

The Jesuits endeavored to become the educators of Eng- 
lish youths as they had those of Germany. They under- 
stood, and have not yet forgotten, the value of this. The 
pope therefore established an English college at Rome, to 
educate young Englishmen for the traitorous purpose of de- 
stroying English institutions. Loyola conceived tins idea as 
a covert aud strategic method of uprooting obnoxious Gov- 
ernments, and the pope accepted it as an effective plan of 
conspiracy. This college became a hotbed of treason. The 
young men were doubtless instructed that the gates of 
heaven would be opened to them in no other way, and that 
country and patriotism were unmeaning phrases, of no sig- 
nificance when weighed in the scale against the interests of 
the papacy and the Jesuits. None have better understood 
than they "that he who guides the youth, directs the des- 
tinies of man." 

The young Englishmen, educated at this college in Rome 
to hate their country and its sovereign, reached the highest 
round in the ladder of collegiate culture when they were 
brought to realize this as the central feature of religious 
faith. It takes a peculiar training to pluck out entirely 
from the mind all the tender and holy memories of home 
and country, of family and friends; and no others in the 
world except the Jesuits have ever undertaken it. They 
boast of this as one of the prominent principles of their 
system, and the distinguishing merit of their society. By 
means of it they succeeded well at Rome, and sent back to 
England a swarm of conspirators, charged with the special 
duty of winning a conquest over the Government, plucking 



THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 135 

Protestantism up by the roots, and re-establishing the papal 
scepter, which Henry VIII, in the pursuit of his illicit 
amours, had broken. 

Elizabeth, as queen, was the great obstacle to papal suc- 
cess. Her position was a peculiar one. At the beginning 
of her reign she had been tolerant towards her Roman Cath- 
olic subjects, and they were permitted to enjoy their religion 
and mode of worship without interference, notwithstanding 
the severities practiced towards the Protestants during the 
preceding reign of Mary. All historians agree, and the 
Roman Catholic Lingard is candid enough to admit, that 
she retained in her royal council eleven of those who had 
served under Mary, and appointed only eight of her own 
selection — an extraordinary instance of impartiality and con- 
servatism. She preferred the reformed religion, but " con- 
trived," says Lingard, "to balance the hopes and fears of the 
two parties" 6 which she must have done from an honest pur- 
pose to see that justice should be shown to both, and that 
religious strife and discord should cease. Her want of suc- 
cess in this most desirable object can be attributed to no 
other cause than the machinations of the Jesuits; for, what- 
soever may be thought of the fierce and angry controversy 
which followed, the evidence is conclusive that they were 
the main reliance of the pope in the subsequent inaugura- 
tion and prosecution of civil war in England. If it had not 
been their special avocation to enter into plots and con- 
spiracies against all governments and peoples who rejected 
the absolute rule of the pope in doctrine and morals, and if 
they had not actively engaged in that work during the reign 
of Elizabeth, the memory of Mary's bloody and persecuting 
reign might, in a large degree, have been blotted out, and 
this impartial policy of Elizabeth might have induced the 
Christians of different religious faiths to live in peace and 
mutual toleration, as they did in Germany before that coun- 



3 History of England. By Lingard. Vol. VI, p. 4. See, also, 
Hume, Vol. IV, p. 4. 



136 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

try was blighted by the curse of Jesuitism. But taught by 
the Jesuits not to submit to equality merely, but to demand 
absolute and unqualified superiority and dominion by the 
entire suppression of Protestantism, the English Roman 
Catholics were encouraged to form leagues and combinations 
and conspiracies against the queen, Protestantism, and the 
Government. 

Under these circumstances, Elizabeth could not have re- 
mained unresisting if she had desired. To have done so 
would have been a treasonable abandoment of the country of 
which she w r as the legitimate sovereign. Not only was she 
assailed in all her rights as queen, but the pope, adopting 
the views and opinions of the Jesuits, impudently attempted 
to justify resistance to her authority upon the ground that 
she was an illegitimate daughter of Henry VIII by Anne 
Boleyn, and therefore had no just right to exact obedience 
to her authority. He went further than this, and claimed 
jurisdiction over her conscience by commanding her to ac- 
cept "the communion of the Roman Church," which, with 
queenly dignity, she refused. He required her to send am- 
bassadors to the Council of Trent, and this she also declined 
to do. When she imprisoned Mary Queen of Scots, he 
usurped jurisdiction over the case, although Mary was an 
English subject, and undertook to procure her release, for 
the reason only that she preferred Romanism to Protestant- 
ism. He sought the aid of the kings of France and Spain to 
make war upon England in the name of religion, to release 
Mary, dethrone Elizabeth, and seize upon her crown. Fail- 
ing in all these things, and being baffled by Elizabeth, he 
caused a prosecution to be instituted at Rome to try "in 
the papal court " her title to the crown — a sham and farce 
as ineffective as it was ridiculous and discreditable. It is 
difficult to imagine a more presumptuous and impotent pro- 
ceeding; but it is instructive as showing the pretensions of 
the popes of that period. 

In the papal indictment Elizabeth was accused, among 
other things, of rejecting the ancient and supporting the 



THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 137 

new worship ; of having " received the sacrament after the 
manner of heretics ;" of having "chosen known heretics for 
the lords of her council ;" and of having " imposed an oath 
derogating from the rights of the Holy See. v The queen, 
of course, did not appear ; but, nevertheless, she was held to 
be in default, and the trial was conducted in the papal 
form. Twelve English Roman Catholics, who are repre- 
sented as " exiles for their religion," were examined as wit- 
nesses, and, after their evidence was heard and considered, 
" the judges pronounced their opinion that she had incurred 
the canonical penalties of heresy." The major one of these, 
which included all the minors, was the forfeiture of her 
crown; that is, her actual dethronement. It is to be sup- 
posed that, in the decree of the Roman Curia, all this was 
recorded in solemn form. But this decree, like those of other 
courts, did not execute itself. Therefore, the pope provided 
for its execution by issuing his pontifical bull, with all nec- 
essary gravity and composure, whereby he pronounced 
Elizabeth guilty of heresy, deprived of her "pretended" 
right to the crown of England, and absolved her subjects 
from all allegiance to her. 4 

Notwithstanding the long period intervening between 
those and the present times, we are not relieved from the 
obligation and necessity of understanding fully upon what 
pretense of authority Pius V assumed the prerogative right 
to pluck from the head of the English queen a crown placed 
there with practical, if not absolute, unanimity by the Eng- 
lish people. It is not enough to say that these things 
occurred in another age and under circumstances peculiar to 
that age. This may sufficiently explain the conduct of indi- 
viduals, and the character and structure of governments, all 
of which have ever been, and will continue to be, liable to 
change. But the laws of God, founded in divine wisdom, 
are not subject to these changes. The creative power of the 
Deity alone can change them. It is the special boast of the 



* Lingard, Vol. VI, p. 110. Nicolini, p. 153. 



138 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

papists and the Jesuits that the system of laws which governs 
the papacy has the stamp of Divine approval upon it, and that, 
therefore, it has always been, and still remains, the same — 
" Semper eadem" is their motto. Hence it is important to us 
to know the nature and extent of the spiritual powers as- 
serted by Pius V over the English Government and people, 
in order to ascertain whether, if a parallel case existed to-day, 
or may exist hereafter, the same papal powers may not be 
again invoked. The question which most concerns us is not 
whether they may or may not be asserted, but whether or 
no they have been embodied in the Canon law of the Roman 
Church, and have been thereby stamped with the character 
of perpetuity. No special pleading, however adroit, can 
make the issue otherwise. 

The question tried and decided at Rome by the Papal 
Curia, in so far as it involved the right to the English crown, 
was exclusively political, and the pope could not rightfully 
change its character by assuming that it was brought within 
his spiritual jurisdiction by virtue of the universality of his 
spiritual powers. It was an English and not a Roman ques- 
tion. By the existing laws of England, Elizabeth was the 
rightful and hereditary heir to the throne, and had posses- 
sion of the crown. It had been so decided by the Parlia- 
ment, and ratified by the people with a unanimity almost 
unknown in those times. She was queen, not only de facto, 
but de jure. By what mode of reasoning or by what perver- 
sion of language could the pope take to himself jurisdiction 
over such a question? England was governed by laws, and 
whether they appear to us now to have been right or wrong, 
they were her own laws, enacted by her rightful authorities. 
They were exclusively political laws, provided for her own 
Government and people. The pope was the spiritual head 
of the Church at Rome, with a recognized jurisdiction over 
the spiritual welfare of those who regarded themselves as 
within that jurisdiction. By the methods of reasoniug then 
adopted by the English nation, and now familiar to all in- 
telligent American minds, all who chose to remain within 



THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 139 

that spiritual jurisdiction had the perfect right to do so; all 
who did not, had an equal right to withdraw from it. Rights 
of this character concern individuals, not nations, except as 
their populations shall decide, in which case they may sub- 
mit or not to this jurisdiction at their pleasure. The Eng- 
lish nation, by its domestic laws, had established a system of 
government suitable for itself, and had placed its crown 
upon Elizabeth's head. To say that the pope had the divine 
right, as the spiritual head of the Church at Rome, to set 
this National Government aside, and substitute for it another 
dictated by himself, and after the papal model, means this, 
and only this: that his spiritual power includes political and 
temporal power over all nations, to the extent of requiring 
them to adopt whatsoever form of religious faith the popes 
shall prescribe, to the absolute exclusion of all other forms. 
And it allows him, moreover, to employ for that purpose, 
against every domestic law to the contrary, all the papal 
machinery of coercion. The decree pronounced at Rome 
against Elizabeth affirms, in effect, that such is the Canon 
law; that is, the law of the Church. Have the provisions 
of that law been authoritatively changed or abrogated since 
the time of Pius V and Elizabeth? It may be necessary to find 
an answer to this question when we come to see, as we shall, 
that, at Jesuit dictation, it has been authoritatively announced 
that the time has come, or is rapidly approaching, when the 
Canon law of the Roman Church shall be introduced into 
the United States, to supersede such of our laws, National 
and State, as are in conflict with it. For the present, we 
must not pass by too rapidly the conflict between the pope 
and Elizabeth — to the principles involved in which enough 
consideration is not generally given — in order that we may 
comprehend fully what it meant, and how, in the end, it 
turned the nations upon their progressive courses, and 
brought them where they now are. Inall history there are 
few more instructive lessons. 

In carrying on the war against Elizabeth, the 'Jesuits 
did not forget the work of educating young Englishmen so 



140 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

as to make them believe that treason was one of the highest 
virtues when dictated by what they chose to consider the 
interests of religion ; that is, of the papacy or of their 
society, just as we have seen they did in Germany. Among 
other seminaries of learning, they had one at Rheims, in 
France, established by the Cardinal of Lorraine, one of the 
most vindictive persecutors of the Huguenots. They had an- 
other at Douay, also in France. From these, colonies of 
Jesuits were sent to England every year, instructed and 
trained to subvert the English Government, and particularly 
to vilify and calumniate Elizabeth by accusing her of 
leading a " licentious and voluptuous private life." It is 
not easy to understand what force was intended to be 
given to this accusation, as an argument against her right 
to the crown, in view of the fact that a life tenfold more 
licentious and voluptuous than that falsely charged against 
Elizabeth did not invalidate the right of Pope Alexander 
VI to the papal crown and the headship of the Church at 
Rome. Nevertheless, the Jesuits availed themselves of it, 
without regard either to its truthfulness or their own con- 
sistency. They were educated to this peculiar kind of 
work, and it was considered their duty to educate others in 
the same way, leaving the consequences to take care of 
themselves Hume gives this account of these Jesuit emissa- 
ries to England: "They infused into all their votaries an 
extreme hatred against the queen, whom they treated as a 
usurper, a schismatic, a heretic, a persecutor of the orthodox, 
and one solemnly and publicly anathematized by the holy 
father. Sedition, rebellion, sometimes assassination, were the 
expedients by which they intended to effect their purposes 
against her," 5 pretending to find in the existing state of 
things in England justification for all this, even for the assas- 
sination of the queen. 

Two Jesuit leaders — Campion and Parson — were sent 
from Rome to give direction to the movements of the con- 



6 History of England. By Hume. Vol. IV, p. 182. 



THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 141 

spirators already there. In order more effectually to en- 
courage treason and sedition, they " pretended to be Protest- 
ants" not being ashamed of this false profession, because the 
obligation to practice deception when necessary was instilled 
into their minds by Jesuit training, and, on that account, 
created no compunctions of conscience. When Parson reached 
Dover, the better to practice his disguise, he wore the uni- 
form of an English army officer, and pretended to be such. 
In this way he deceived the inspecting officer, and arranged 
with him for the safe passage of Campion, whom he repre- 
sented as a fellow officer, who would follow in a few days. It 
may thus be seen how easy it is to be "all things to all 
men," when those who desire to become so have quieted their 
consciences with the belief that falsehood and deception may 
be rightfully employed in promoting " the greater glory of 
God." Howsoever incomprehensible may be the casuistry 
by which the mind can be brought to this belief, it is per- 
fectly plain to a Jesuit, and is doubtless explained in their 
schools. 

It is exceedingly difficult to separate the true from the 
false in the history of the times here referred to. The pas- 
sions of the rival parties became so intense as seemingly to 
render agreement between them impossible, either with re- 
gard to facts or conclusions. It may not even be safe to as- 
sume that the truth lies midway between the extremes. But 
there is always, in the influences and effects produced by 
any given period of time, that which explains the motives 
and purposes of the chief actors. By careful .investigation 
of these, we acquire a knowledge of the philosophy of history. 
Conducting our investigations in this spirit, we can not fail 
to conclude that the interference with the domestic and inter- 
nal affairs of England by an alien and foreign power, was a 
flagrant act of usurpation, unless the spiritual authority of the 
pope gave him rightful jurisdiction over temporal and polit- 
ical questions in that country. And if he did rightfully 
possess this jurisdiction in 1570, when Pius V fulminated 
his pontifical bull against Elizabeth, and derived it from the 



142 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

divine law, we, of the present age, and especially in the 
United States, can not refrain from inquiring whether, from 
the Jesuit standpoint, Leo XIII does not possess the same 
jurisdiction derived from the same law? Without pressing 
this inquiry here, however, it is deemed more essential to as- 
certain still more minutely how far the Jesuits were respon- 
sible for sowing the seeds of discord and civil war in Eng- 
land, when otherwise Protestants and Roman Catholics 
might, at the Elizabethan period, have lived and associated 
harmoniously together, as they did in Germany before the 
Jesuits appeared there. Many intelligent readers of history 
fail to give due consideration to the events of this important 
period. 

We have seen — upon the authority of Lingard, a papal 
historian — that Elizabeth was, at the beginning of her reign, 
desirous of holding an equal balance between the rival bodies 
of Christians. Her mind was not fully made up with regard 
to her own faith, although it is probable she was inclined to 
Protestantism. There were reasons for this, some of which 
may have been controlling with a masculine mind like hers. 
The relations between her father, Henry VIII, and the 
papacy must have created impressions not favorable to the 
pope as a sharer in her governing power over~ the English 
people. And the reign of her sister Mary must have tended 
to strengthen, rather than remove, these impressions. She 
could not have failed to know that Mary's marriage to 
Philip II of Spain had brought with it to England a series 
of calamities, the remembrance of which must have made 
her not only sorrowful, but indignant. If Mary's natural 
inclination had been kindly and her heart benevolent, it 
must have been apparent to Elizabeth that these good qual- 
ities had been exchanged for others of the very opposite 
character, which had incited her to prosecute her Protestant 
subjects in the spirit of intense religious bigotry, and as if 
God were acceptably served by shedding blood. And when, 
upon coming to the throne as the immediate successor of 
Mary, she found herself confronted by the terrible condition 



THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 143 

into which England had been thrown — with every evil pas- 
sion aroused, and little ground for hope of the future — noth- 
ing was more natural than the belief that this state of things 
had been produced, mainly if not entirely, by the unfortunate 
marriage of Mary with Philip II, who possessed such a com- 
bination of bad qualities as left room for scarcely a single 
good one. Sullen, morose, and selfish, Philip separated him- 
self from everything in life calculated to encourage good or 
benevolent emotions, and gave free play to that bad ambition 
which led him to desolate the Netherlands by cruelties as 
unparalleled as they were atrocious. He had no affection 
for Mary, being incapable of any such emotion. His mar- 
riage with her was a matter of policy alone — one of those 
political unions which, in the course of time, have produced 
evils to all the Governments of Europe. He had inherited 
religious fanaticism from his father, Charles V, but without 
any of the better qualities of the latter; and gave such ex- 
cessive indulgence to his hatred of Protestants that noth- 
ing rejoiced him so much as to know that the dungeons of 
the Inquisition were crowded with them, and that none of 
them escaped the rack, the thumb-screw, and the flames. 
The best people in England — Roman Catholics as well as 
Protestants — had feared, when this ill-fated marriage was 
proposed, that the bloody scenes so often witnessed on the 
Continent would be repeated there, and for that reason op- 
posed it. But State policy prevailed, and the popular will 
was of no avail. England, thus united with Spain, became 
subject to the influence of Philip, who employed it over 
Mary, to make her, like himself, the obedient instrument of 
papal outrages. English persecution hitherto had one dis- 
tinguishing characteristic, in this, that Henry VIII had vis- 
ited his vengeance upon both Protestants and Roman Cath- 
olics, who were bound alike to the stake and burned to death 
because of resistance to his royal power and assumed right, 
in imitation of the pope, to hold the consciences of individ- 
uals in subjugation. Elizabeth knew all this. Her strong 
and sagacious mind was penetrating enough to foresee that, 



144 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

unless this disheartening course of events could be in some 
way changed, England would remain where Mary had left 
her — a mere appendage to the papacy — and thereby reduced 
to a condition of inferiority among the nations from which 
she might never recover. 

When Philip proposed to marry Elizabeth — for whom he 
had no more affection than he had -for her sister — she was 
brought to realize, if she had not already done so, that the 
future destiny of England was mainly in her hands. From 
motives of policy she took time to deliberate before accept- 
ing or rejecting this proposition of marriage by Philip. 
Whilst holding it under advisement, she suggested that it 
would violate the law of the Church, inasmuch as their re- 
lationship brought them within the prohibited degrees. But 
when Philip proposed that he would obtain a dispensation 
from the pope, she saw at once that it was a well-matured 
scheme to bring her to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the 
pope over English affairs of State, and consequently declined 
Philip's proposal. And thus was broken the alliance be- 
tween the two crowns of England and Spain, and Elizabeth 
was left to protect herself against foreign interference in 
taking care of the internal affairs of her own country. The 
occasion demanded that she should assert herself by taking 
the affairs of the nation in her own hands, and the result 
has long since proved how well and conspicuously she did so. 

Elizabeth was w 7 ise. Her bitterest enemies concede this. 
Whilst she may have inclined to Protestantism, she had not, 
at the beginning of her reign, acquired any positive dislike 
to the Roman Catholic religion. On the contrary, the Ro- 
man Catholic bishops and lords were disposed to regard her 
exhibition of tolerance as indicating that she would, at least, 
act w r ith justice and impartiality towards them. Camden, 
the historian, says that, during Mary's reign, Elizabeth had 
intimated to Cardinal Pole that she had a disposition to pre- 
fer Roman Catholicism. Howsoever this may have been, 
she not only sometimes attended confession, but assisted at 
divine service after the manner of the Roman Church. 



THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 145 

LiDgard says: "She continued to assist, and occasionally to 
communicate, at mass; she buried her sister with all the 
solemnities of the Catholic ritual; and she ordered a solemn 
dirge and a mass of requiem for the soul of the Emperor 
Charles V." 6 Influenced by these considerations, and prob- 
ably by others of the same character, the House of Lords — 
composed entirely of Roman Catholics — declared in her 
favor, and the Commons having readily and unanimously 
approved their decision, she was proclaimed queen "with the 
acclamations of the people." Thus her right to the crown 
was settled by the highest authority in the kingdom. There- 
was not a murmur of discontent. Some regretted the death 
of Mary, but there was a general desire that the barbarities 
practiced during her reign should cease. In that desire 
Elizabeth manifestly shared, as is well established by the 
fact, already stated, that she retained thirteen of Mary's 
counselors, and appointed only eight Protestants. She could 
have meant nothing else by this than to express the desire 
that religious persecution should cease, aud that the two re- 
ligious parties should in the future live in peace with each 
other, and thus enable the country to develop into 
greatness. 

The first attack upon her right to the crown was made by 
Henry II of France, and not by her Roman Catholic sub- 
jects. Henry was thoroughly indoctrinated with the perse- 
cuting spirit which prevailed in France ^imong the defenders 
of the papacy, and was dominated over by the Guises, one 
of whom was the Cardinal of Lorraine, and patron of the 
Jesuits. His persecution of the Reformers has been previ- 
ously mentioned. In assailing the title of Elizabeth, Henry 
II had undoubtedly several objects in view, the chief of 
which were to humiliate England and probably establish 
French sovereignty over it, to continue the policy of Mary 
in persecuting the Protestants, and to place the crown of 
Elizabeth upon the head of Mary Queen of Scots. Whether 



6 Lingard, Vol. VI, p. 4. 

10 



146 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

one or all these motives influenced him, he solicited the aid 
of the pope, and made himself a party to the conspiracy 
against the peace of England by endeavoring to obtain a 
papal decree that Elizabeth was a bastard, and therefore 
not lawfully queen. Consequently, when, after her rejection 
of Philip's proposal of marriage, she saw the Roman Catholic 
powers, with the pope at their head, conspiring against her, 
she resolved that her own safety and that of England required 
her to dismiss the Roman Catholic members of her council, 
declare her purpose to protect and encourage the Reformed 
religion, and submit the matter to the people by means of a 
Parliament to be assembled for that purpose. This precau- 
tionary measure was most commendable, inasmuch as it pro- 
posed to submit to Parliament the question whether or no 
the two religions were equally entitled to legal protection. 
In order that her purposes might be fully understood, she 
issued a proclamation allowing divine service to be performed 
in the English tongue, and the Scriptures to be read by the 
Jaity — a privilege hitherto denied them. In order to allay 
all undue excitement, she expressly prohibited religious 
"controversy by preaching," until the meeting of Parlia- 
ment. When the new Parliament did assemble, it was ad- 
dressed in her behalf by the Keeper of the Great Seal, who 
announced to the representatives of the people that the 
queen had commanded him to exhort them "to take a mean 
between the two extremes of superstition and irreligion, 
which might reunite the partisans of both tlw one and the other 
religion in the same public worship." 7 

The conciliatory course of Elizabeth, as indicated by her 
proclamation and this address to Parliament, exhibited a de- 
gree of liberality to which the English people had been un- 
accustomed during the reign of Mary. It is a reasonable 
supposition that, if her suggestions had been accepted in the 
spirit in which they were offered, England would have 

' History of England. By Rapin. Vol. VIII, pp. 217 to 232. 



THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 147 

bounded forward far more rapidly than she did to the con- 
dition she subsequently reached through severe and pro- 
tracted trials. . The times were suited to the introduction of 
compromising measures of peaceful policy. The people 
were tired of commotion, persecution, and bloodshed on ac- 
count of religious differences, and would readily have ac- 
quiesced in any amicable plan of adjustment. But, unfor- 
tunately for England, and the world as well, neither the 
interests nor the wishes of the people were of sufficient avail 
to bring quiet to the country. The course of subsequent 
events may be easily traced. The papal machinery of 
Church government had been so constructed at Rome that, 
in order to keep the people in subjection, it had deposited 
unlimited powers in the hands of the prelates. The Roman 
Catholic bishops of England, as well as elsewhere, had been 
accustomed to rule with a rod of iron, and the time had not 
arrived when they could be reconciled to any diminution 
of their ecclesiastical authority. They became "alarmed," 
says Lingard, at the position taken by Elizabeth. They un- 
doubtedly viewed it only in its relation to themselves and 
the interests of the Church at Rome — or, rather, of the 
papacy — without bestowing a moment's thought upon the 
general welfare of England. They regarded conciliation as 
a form of heresy not to be tolerated. What they desired 
was the extirpation of Protestantism and the unity of the 
Roman Church, assured by the establishment of its religion 
to the exclusion of any dissenting faith. Accordingly, they 
assembled themselves together to consult "whether they 
could in conscience officiate at the coronation" of a queen 
who proposed so to adjust religious differences as to put an 
end to all interference with the right of individuals to 
freedom of conscience. Upon various pretexts they decided 
not to attend, or to take part in, the ceremony of coronation. 
Consequently, the ceremony was performed with the attend- 
ance of only a single bishop, and was made " to conform to all 
the rites of the Catholic pontifical." This decision and con- 



148 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

duct of the bishops "created considerable embarrassment," 
and might have produced serious consequences but for the 
withdrawal of this siugle bishop from his associates. 8 

The non-attendance of the Roman Catholic bishops upon 
the coronation of Elizabeth was a signal for opening the old 
strife. It was unquestionably intended upon their part to 
array their followers in opposition to the conciliatory meas- 
ures of the queen ; and it did not take long, in those days, 
to be so understood upon both sides. The consequence was 
that the public excitement was imparted to Parliament, and 
led to the repeal of several of the statutes of Mary, and the 
substitution for them of others whereby the Reformed relig- 
ion was made national, and penalties prescribed for refusing 
so to recognize it. This, of course, led to severe measures 
and to persecution, in imitation of the example set during the 
reign of Mary, and produced the unfortunate condition of 
affairs with which all readers of English history are familiar. 
Upon which side, during the long controversy that followed, 
the responsibility rested most heavily, is not easily decided. 
Wrongs were undoubtedly inflicted by both sides. But 
whatsoever these w T ere, they grew out of the spirit of that 
age, and had their origin, as we have seen, in the influences 
created by the papacy, aided by Jesuit intrigues. The fact, 
however, which most nearly concerns our present inquiries is 
what has just been stated, that the first step taken in the 
direction towards the renewal of religious agitation was the 
organized opposition of the bishops to Elizabeth, formed for 
the purpose of defeatiug the measures of pacification she had 
proposed to Parliament. It is impossible not to have known 
that the defeat of those measures by the combined opposi- 
tion of the bishops would lead to a revival of the hatreds 
which had been encouraged under Mary, and, therefore, to 
oppose them was to invite that revival for which, conse- 
quently, these bishops were responsible. 

Whether the Protestants would have accepted or rejected 



8 Lingard, Vol. VI, p. 5. 



THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 149 

the proposition of Elizabeth can not now be decided with 
positive certainty; all the probabilities indicate that they 
would have accepted them. One thing, however, is certain, 
they were rejected by the Roman Catholics under the lead 
of their bishops. This, of course, revived the old animosi- 
ties, but with increased violence. Throughout all the de- 
partments of society passion became greatly intensified. 
Nevertheless, the questions involved were English questions 
alone. They were primarily and chiefly political, although 
having politico-religious aspects. But they involved only 
the internal and domestic condition of England. No alien 
or foreign power had the right, by international or other 
law, or consistently with what is now universal usage 
among civilized nations, to interfere with them. But we 
have seen that they were interfered with, not only by a 
direct attempt to make the policy of the country conform 
to that dictated by a foreign power, but in the threatening 
form of a conspiracy between the king of France and the 
pope, to impeach the title of Elizabeth upon the ground that 
she was a bastard, to which she could not have submitted 
without disgrace. We have also seen how this conspir- 
acy moved stealthily forward, step by step, until she was 
tried at Rome by an alien tribunal, pronounced a usurper 
by a decree which declared her crown to have been forfeited 
and her subjects released from their natural and lawful 
allegiance. And in order that her escape from the wrath 
and vengeance of the pope should become impossible, swarms 
of incendiary Jesuits were turned loose upon the country, to 
fan the flames of discord, stir up rebellion and civil war, 
and carry into execution the judgment and sentence of the 
papal court at Rome. If Elizabeth erred in defending her- 
self and her kingdom against this formidable and dangerous 
combination, her error was upon the side of patriotism ; and 
she is scarcely censurable for it, inasmuch as the life of the 
nation, and probably her own life, were the stake for which 
her enemies were playing. And whether it be true or not, 
that the Jesuits attempted her assassination — as some his- 



150 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

torians allege — it must be accepted in her praise that, al- 
though a woman, she taught her assailants that she was 
"every inch a queen," and that England under her reign 
became enabled to convince all these rival powers that she 
was competent to conduct her own affairs and take care of 
herself — facts sufficiently demonstrated by her advanced posi- 
tion among the modern progressive nations. 

Every American mind should be duly impressed by this 
portion of English history, showing, as it does, how fierce and 
protracted was the struggle which led, in the end, to popu- 
lar government, and the civil and religious freedom which it 
alone has guaranteed. Elizabeth was undoubtedly a great 
queen — great in the qualities of her intellect, in the stead- 
fastness of her purposes, in that manly courage which 
" mounteth with occasion." When she became queen, the 
people of England, both Protestants and Roman Catholics, 
were tired of religious persecution, and anxious to put an 
end to it. She favored and recommended to Parliament 
measures of pacification, in the spirit of liberality and toler- 
ation. If, obeying the dictates of her own conscience, she 
preferred Protestantism to Roman Catholicism, she had such 
respect for the conscientious convictions of others as to de- 
sire that all her subjects should be secured in~ the right to 
accept either the one or the other at their own discretion. 
By the avowal of these and other kindred purposes, she in- 
curred the opposition of the Roman Catholic bishops, who, 
in concert with foreign powers, and backed by the pope and 
his Jesuit militia, brought on a civil war which afflicted 
England with a long train of evils and calamities. Under 
the influence of her liberalism, the bulk of the population 
became tolerant of each other, and, by the great unanimity 
with which they accepted her as queen, indicated the desire 
that the protection of the Government should be given to 
both forms of worship. And it may be accepted as a fair 
inference from what then transpired, that she was defeated 
in her plan of conciliation only by the animosities engen- 
dered by the English bishops, the pope, and the Jesuits. 



THE JESUITS IN ENGLAND. 151 

Her defeat, however, was not final ; and having survived 
the machinations of all her enemies, even the excommunica- 
tion and anathemas of the pope, together with the stealthy 
plottings of the Jesuits, the pages which record the events of 
her reign constitute some of the brightest in English history. 
They teach a philosophy that will not be forgotten so long 
as free popular institutions shall continue to exist. 



CHAPTER IX. 

JESUIT INFLUENCE IN INDIA. 

The reader who shall intelligently trace the history of 
the Jesuit through their conspiracies against the peace of 
Europe, and especially their tireless efforts to eradicate 
everything that tended to freedom of conscience and the 
public enlightenment, will not wonder that, during the last 
century, it became necessary to the interests of society and 
the Church that one of the foremost of the popes should 
suppress and entirely abolish the order. Awd as that event 
was brought about, not alone on account of the odium they 
incurred by intermeddling with the temporal affairs of States, 
but because they pursued practices which shocked the whole 
Christian world, their society can not be thoroughly under- 
stood without becoming familiar with the history of their 
missionary enterprises. As they prosecuted these among 
ignorant and illiterate multitudes of peoples, where no watch- 
ful eye could observe them, they have mainly become. their 
own historians ; yet there is enough to be discovered to show 
that, at every stage of their development, they have been 
true to the injunction of their founder, to be "all things to 
all men." 

Loyola considered his society superior to the ancient 
monastic orders. We have seen that he looked upon the 
latter as corrupted, and no longer worthy to be intrusted 
with the work of Christian missions, on which account he 
claimed for his society superior jurisdiction in the missionary 
field. There, among populations unable to detect imposture, 
his followers had their own way, made their own history, 
and executed their own purposes, without intelligent popular 
inspection. Consequently, when he realized the odium his 
152 



JESUIT INFLUENCE IN INDIA. 153 

society had encountered among European peoples, he con- 
sidered it necessary to remove this by setting up for it ex- 
aggerated claims of merit in the missionary work. By this 
means he evidently hoped to be able to appeal successfully 
to the pope and the Church to protect the Jesuits from the 
rising indignation of such Christians as had resisted their 
introduction into France. Hence it became a fixed Jesuit 
habit, and yet is, to shield the society under pretense 
that it is a necessary part of the Church machinery, and 
that the Church can not exist without it. And out of that 
same necessity must have grown that multitude of miracles, 
said to have been performed in remote and unfrequented 
parts of the world, and in the manufacture of which the 
Jesuits have acquired the reputation of being thorough 
adepts. It was not a difficult matter in those days to im- 
pose upon superstitious people by the claim of miraculous 
powers. None understood this better than the Jesuits. 

The first important mission of the Jesuits was to the 
East Indies, in charge of Francis Xavier, one of the most 
impressible of Loyola's converts. This mission is of chief 
importance, inasmuch as it was initiatory, and conspicuously 
displays the operations of the society whilst under the im- 
mediate personal charge of its founder. It indicates the 
methods of the Jesuit missionary system, and how they were 
made to conform to the main purpose of acquiring domin- 
ion, with but little regard to the means employed. There 
are very few of the present age who do not regard many of 
the recorded events as apocryphal — notwithstanding, the 
overcredulous have accepted them as true for many cen- 
turies. They are only important now because we learn from 
them the prominent characteristics of the Jesuits, and the 
real foundation of the reputation to which they so boastingly 
lay claim. 

The Portuguese had, some years before, acquired the oc- 
cupancy of territory in India, with a commercial capital and 
an episcopal see at Goa. By means of these influences a 
number of the natives had professed Christianity, and, along 



154 FOOTPRINTS OF TEE JESUITS. 

with all the Portuguese Christians, paid spiritual allegiance 
to the pope. But the condition of society was by no means 
favorable to the practice of the Christian virtues. On the 
contrary, it had become greatly demoralized, rivaling Rome 
and the principal cities of Europe in that respect. In "The 
Lives of the Saints" — a work of standard ecclesiastical au- 
thority in the Roman Church — the author represents "re- 
venge, ambition, avarice, usury, and debauchery," as exten- 
sively prevailing at Goa. According to him, the Indians 
who had professed conversion were so influenced by the 
example of the Portuguese that they had "relapsed into 
their ancient manners and superstitions." Even those who 
professed to be Christians "lived in direct opposition to the 
gospel which they professed, and by their manners alienated 
the infidels from the faith." 1 

Those familiar with the condition of ecclesiastical affairs 
in Europe at that time, and especially with the immorality 
prevailing at Rome, will not be surprised at this description 
of things at so remote a place as the Portuguese possessions 
in India. Of course, such tendency to demoralization could 
not long exist anywhere without producing absolute social 
degradation. To prevent this, the king of Portugal made 
an attempt to reform these abuses, influenced probably by 
the twofold purpose of desiring to spread Christianity and 
to improve the commercial interests of his subjects. Xavier, 
therefore, was sent to India under his auspices, and was 
better fitted for that purpose than Loyola himself would 
have been, because he was less ambitious, less selfish, and 
more conscientious. Whilst he possessed some commendable 
traits of character and wonderful energy, much that has 
been written about him by papal and Jesuit authors can only 
be considered as imaginary, and as deserving no permanent 
place in history. The character assigned to him is perfectly 
angelic, with scarcely any mixture of humanity; and, like 



1 Lives of the Saints. By the Rev. Alban Butler. Vol. XII, 
article " St. Francis Xavier," December 3, p. 608. 



JESUIT INFLUENCE IN INDIA. 155 

Loyola, he is represented as having performed a vast num- 
ber of miracles, even to the extent of restoring the dead to 
life! With regard to these, he is said to have resembled 
Loyola in another respect — in that he, too, performed more 
miracles than Christ! It is not difficult to perceive the ob- 
ject of all this, when it is considered that the pretenses were 
set up at a time when an unenlightened public were easily 
misled by them. They, like the innumerable myths of the 
Middle Ages, answered the ends of their inventors, and are 
no further useful now than as they serve to show, not only 
the character of the society which required them to be ac- 
cepted as absolutely true, but that of those who invented 
and employed them to mislead the credulous and unsuspect- 
ing multitude. The entire account of Xavier's mission is so 
mixed up with these idle tales that the time spent in their 
perusal would be wasted, but for the reason that they bring 
prominently before us some of the distinguishing character- 
istics of the Jesuits, under the tuition and during the lives 
of the founder of their society and his most confidential 
colleague. 

When he reached Goa, Xavier found the Portuguese 
Christians in the demoralized condition already mentioned. 
The order of Franciscans had there an established monas- 
tery, which, as we may suppose, needed to be reformed, in- 
asmuch as they do not seem to have been excepted from 
other professing Christians in the general charge of immo- 
rality. We do not learn from Jesuit authors how far this 
order was in fact reformed, since the eulogists of Xavier 
consider it to have been his greatest glory that he brought 
vast multitudes of the natives into the Christian fold, and 
thereby established Jesuit authority and dominion in India 
in place of that which the Church, under the patronage of 
the pope and by means of the long-established religious 
orders, had already acquired there. This was manifestly the 
view which Xavier himself took of his mission, as is plainly 
shown by his conduct. Instead of co-operating with the 
established Church authorities and with the monks at Goa, 



156 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

he entered upon an independent course of his own, whereby 
he evidently intended to indicate the superiority of his Jesuit 
methods. He roamed the streets with a bell in his hand, 
and when the ringing attracted a crowd of curious lookers-on, 
he iuvited them "to send their children and slaves to cate- 
chism," so as to learn the truths of Christianity from him. 
When the children gathered around him, prompted alone by 
curiosity, he taught them "the Creed and practices of devo- 
tion," which, of course, could have been nothing more than 
the simplest form. After following this method for some 
time, he engaged in public preaching, and it is gravely said 
that "in half a year" he accomplished the "reformation of 
the whole city of Goa," which must have included the native 
along with the Portuguese population. The whole story is 
told after the manner of the romance-writers. 

Reflecting people, who read of the immense multitudes 
converted to Christianity under his eloquent preaching, not 
only at Goa, but in other parts of India, will naturally won- 
der how all this could have occurred when the natives did 
not understand his language, nor he theirs! But the Jesuits 
have no difficulty on that score — nor, indeed, on any other — 
when the simple invention of a miracle will serve their pur- 
pose. Xavier became as famous as Loyola in this respect. 
Butler represents him as having "baptized ten thousand 
Indians with his own hand in one month," and "sometimes 
a whole village" in a single day; and as "having preached 
to five or six thousand persons together," but without stating 
in what language he preached. Seeming, however, to antici- 
pate that there might be some to inquire how much of real 
Christianity there was in these professed conversions, and 
how he could have preached with so much effect to those 
whose language he could not speak and who could not under- 
stand his, he endeavors to remove the difficulty — evidently 
following the Jesuit story — by declaring that, while in India, 
" God first communicated to him the gift of tongues," so that 
"he spoke very well the language of those barbarians without 
having learned it, and had no need of an interpreter when he 



JESUIT INFL UENCE IN INDIA. 157 

instructed them!" 2 It is impossible now to decide how this 
statement originated. Xavier reported only to Loyola — not 
to the pope or the Church — and whatsoever was circulated 
in Europe to aid the cause of the Jesuits, and to gain them 
popularity on account of the success of their missions, was 
derived from him. But whether it originated with Xavier 
or Loyola, or was invented after the death of both, neither 
the repetition of it now, nor its recent appearance in an 
authoritative ecclesiastical volume, published and extensively 
circulated in the United States, can relieve it from the sus- 
picion of a fabulous origin. 

During the brief slay of Xavier at Goa, he availed him- 
self of the opportunity of setting an example which the 
Jesuits of every subsequent period have been prompt to imi- 
tate — an example which gives practical interpretation to the 
Jesuit vow of "extreme poverty." The Franciscan monks 
had erected a seminary, where they taught the native youths 
at least the rudiments of a Christian education. But Xavier 
was not satisfied with this, having manifestly conceived the 
idea, still maintained by the Jesuits, that the cause of edu- 
cation should be intrusted solely to them, on account of their 
superiority over all others, including every religious order. 
Influenced presumably by this consideration alone, he con- 
ceived a plan of having the Franciscan seminary turned 
over to him, with the view of converting it into a Jesuit 
college. Claiming that he was a more immediate and re- 
sponsible representative of the Church than any of the monas- 
tic orders, inasmuch as the brief of the pope conferred special 
missionary prerogatives upon him, he succeeded in effecting 
his purpose by inducing the Franciscans to transfer the 
building to him. Whereupon the Franciscans were left to 
engage in such other methods as they could to minister to 
the Portuguese Christians and convert the natives, whilst 
Xavier was permitted to establish his Jesuit college, so that 



2 History of the Saints. By the Rev. Alban Butler, Yol. XII, 
article "St. Francis Xavier," December 3, p. 610. 



158 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

whatsoever renown should follow the Indian missions might 
inure to the benefit of the Jesuits, and not to that of the 
monastic orders. The Jesuits have never since then lost 
sight of this idea or failed to profit by it, always taking care 
in making up the history of these missions to place their 
society in the front and the monastic orders in the back- 
ground, notwithstanding the latter preceded them in India. 
They seem disinclined to allow the least credit to any of the 
missionary agencies which the Church had been accustomed 
to employ. 

Having obtained possession of the Franciscan seminary 
at Goa, Xavier decided that the building should be improved, 
so as to impress the simple natives with the superiority of the 
Jesuits over the monks. To an ordinary mind this would 
appear to be a difficult thing to accomplish, inasmuch as it 
is not probable that voluntary contributions could have been 
procured in such a community. But to Xavier it was easy 
to overcome so trivial a difficulty as this, as it always has 
been to the Jesuits, without finding the least impediment in 
the vow of " extreme poverty." All he had to do was to 
employ the Portuguese troops stationed at Goa "in pulliug 
down the heathen temples in the neighborhood of Goa, and 
appropriating their very considerable property, for the use 
and benefit of the new college." 3 Admirable strategy! The 
poor natives were powerless to resist the Portuguese troops 
with arms in their hands, and were compelled to stand by in 
silence and see their property despoiled without compensa- 
tion, all under the pretense that "the greater glory of God" 
required it, when, in fact, it was prompted by Jesuit ambi- 
tion. Xavier must have felt gratified at his inexpensive 
mode of improving his new college, and Loyola undoubtedly 
rejoiced when the fact was reported to him. The former, 
therefore, having so successfully occupied the missionary 
field at Goa by this display of Jesuit power to the natives, 
and by reducing the Franciscan monks to inferiority, has- 



3 Griesinger, pp. 88-89. 



JESUIT INFLUENCE IN INDIA. 159 

tened to other parts of India, to carry on the work he had 
begun under such flattering auspices. 

He proceeded to the coast of Malabar, where the mission- 
aries previously sent from Goa, under the authority and 
within the jurisdiction of that episcopal see, had baptized a 
large number of the natives, whom they claimed to have 
been converted to Christianity under the methods employed 
by them. But in order to make it appear that these mis- 
siouaries were inefficient and incompetent, the Jesuits pre- 
tend that these professed converts still "retained their super- 
stitions and vices," 4 and that it was absolutely necessary 
they should be brought under the influence of Xavier. The 
purpose of this, at that time, was to prove to the Christian 
world that the Church and the papacy had failed to accom- 
plish any good missionary results through the agency of the 
monks, and that the Jesuits were absolutely indispensable. 
In this way it was hoped, doubtless, to overcome the preju- 
dice existing against the society in Europe. Therefore, 
Xavier is represented as having saved the Malabar converts 
from relapsing into heathenism, and increased the number 
of natives who submitted to baptism. Whilst all this is 
spoken in his praise, it is quite certain, from the most favor- 
able accounts, that they entertain but little, if any, just con- 
ception of the ceremony of baptism, or, indeed, of any of the 
fundamental principles of Christianity. 

The first effort of Xavier upon the Malabar Coast was at 
Cape Comorin, in a village "full of idolaters," to whom 
he preached; but as they were unable to understand what 
he said, they remained unmoved, having been probably at- 
tracted, like the people of Goa, by his bell-ringing in the 
streets. Why the " gift of tongues" was then withheld from 
him is not easy to determine, unless it was that he might 
be furnished an opportunity of impressing the ignorant na- 
tives with sentiments of awe by performing a miracle. At 
all events, Butler records what happened in these words : "A 



4 Butler, pp. 608, 609. 



160 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

woman who had been three days in the pains of childbirth, 
without being eased by any remedies or prayers of the Brah- 
mins, was immediately delivered, and recovered upon being 
instructed in the faith, and baptized by St. Francis [Xavier], 
as he himself relates in a letter to St. Ignatius [Loyola]." 
How she was instructed in the faith is, of course, not ex- 
plained, it being left to the imagination of the reader to 
conceive by what extraordinary process this ignorant woman 
was instructed in the Christian faith, so that she could 
be rightfully baptized into the Church, when she did not 
understand the language in which she was addressed. If 
she even realized that her safe delivery and instantaneous 
restoration were occasioned by his intervention, there was no 
possible mode of conveying to her mind the idea that it was 
God's work and not Xavier's, for there was no word in any 
of the languages of India signifying the Deity in the Chris- 
tian sense. The whole story is not only preposterous, but 
puerile. But it bears the unmistakable stamp of Jesuitism, 
like others of the same general character. For example, it 
is seriously recorded by the same author, that after the hap- 
pening of this event, " the chief persons of the country list- 
ened to his doctrine, and heartily embraced the faith." He 
preached to those who had never before heard of Christ, 
"and so great were the multitude which he baptized, that 
sometimes, by the bare fatigue of administering that sacra- 
ment, he was scarcely able to move his arm, according to 
the account which he gave to his brethren in Europe." He 
healed the sick by baptism, and where his presence was im- 
practicable, he sent a neophyte to touch them with a cross, 
when, if they signified a desire to be baptized, they were re- 
stored to health. In addition, it is also said that he brought 
back to life four persons who were dead, during the fifteen 
months he remained upon the Malabar Coast. 5 

He had preached at Travancore, near Comorin, where 
he was more favored by having the "gift of tongues" given 



5 Butler, p. 609. 



JESUIT 1NFL UENCE IN INDIA. 161 

to him, so that he could speak in one language as well as an- 
other. Thus endowed, as the Jesuits insist, with divine 
power, he dispersed and drove out of the country "a tribe of 
savages and public robbers/' who were in search of plunder, 
by approaching them with a crucifix in his hand, although 
they had never heard of a crucifix before, and had no means 
of knowing what it signified. When the people of a village 
near Travancore remained uninfluenced by his preaching — 
an event not at all wonderful considering their utter igno- 
rance of Christianity — he is represented as having again re- 
sorted to a miracle, which was the never-failing Jesuit 
resource. He had a grave opened, which contained a body 
interred the day before, and, after putrefaction had com- 
menced, restored it to life and "perfect health." Near the 
same place he also brought back to life a young man whose 
corpse he met on the way to the grave. " Thes*e miracles/' 
says Butler, "made so great an impression upon the people 
that the whole kingdom of Travancore was subjected to Christ 
in a few months, except the king and some of his courtiers." 6 

Every enlightened mind will reject such tales as pure 
fictions — as absolutely incredible. They trifle with serious 
things, and their inventors act in imitation of those who 
make merchandise of human souls. It directly impeaches 
the wisdom of Providence to pretend that he permitted mira- 
cles to be performed in his name — even the dead to be raised 
to life — to influence the destiny of an ignorant heathen pop- 
ulation utterly unable to appreciate the character and teach- 
ings of Christ, whilst, at the same time, he permitted almost 
every variety of vice and corruption to prevail among the in- 
telligent populations of Europe, and to fester about the very 
heart of the papacy itself. 

The accounts of what was done by Xavier in the various 
parts of India are of the same general character as the fore- 
going, the chief variations being in the kind of miracles per- 
formed by him. To minds capable of subjecting them to 



e Butler, p. 611. 

11 



162 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the test of reason and common sense, it is impossible to 
avoid the conclusion that they were either invented by 
Xavier himself, and sent to Europe to aid Loyola in giving 
popularity to the Jesuits, or were made up by them after 
his death for the same purpose. In point of fact, his whole 
claim to be considered as the " Apostle of the Indies" rests 
upon a flimsy and unsubstantial foundation. This is espe- 
cially so, in view of the fact that the multitudes he pre- 
tended to convert were turned into professing Christians by 
the simple ceremony of baptism. Some of them may possi- 
bly have been able to repeat the invocations "Our Father" 
and " Hail Mary," but without any intelligent conception of 
the difference between the one Omnipotent God of the Chris- 
tians and the many gods they had been accustomed to wor- 
ship, or of the meaning of the words uttered to them by 
Xavier, or of the sacraments he administered, or of any 
of the attributes of the Deity, or of a single essential prin- 
ciple in the Christian Creed. Nevertheless, other accounts 
are added, whereby he is represented as having visited other 
places upon the Indian coast, where like results are said to 
have been produced, until, after having remained about 
seven years in the East Indies, he went to Japan to bring 
that idolatrous nation under the same influences, leaving 
the bulk of his Indian converts to succumb to the dominion 
of the Brahmins, and sink back into heathenism. He did 
not seem to realize that true conversion to the Christian 
faith involves the sympathetic emotions of the heart, the in- 
telligent action of the mind, and that without these, no signs, 
or genuflexions, or empty words spoken merely from the 
lips, can give substantial value to the profession of it. A 
knowledge of the manual of arms does not impart to a cow- 
ard the bravery of a true soldier, nor does the repetition of 
a few familiar words convert a parrot into an intelligent 
being. And not a whit more can a heathen, who never 
heard of Christ, be converted into a Christian by any form 
of words, or by any bodily gestures, unless his mind has 
been touched and his heart stirred by some knowledge of 



JESUIT INFL UENCE IN INDIA. 163 

what and who God is, and of the wisdom of his providences 
displayed in the creation and government of the universe. 

One would suppose that the "gift of tongues," when 
once conferred upon Xavier, remained with him, inasmuch 
as he could not convey his thoughts to the multitudes of 
people in any other way. But, strange to say, it was other- 
wise. This miraculous gift was a mere "transient favor ," 7 
conferred only for a season, during his intercourse with some 
of the heathen populations of India, and withdrawn as mirac- 
ulously as it had been given. What strange infatuation it 
must be to accept it as true that, after he had been divinely 
endowed with the faculty of preaching to the people of India in 
their own languages, he should have entered upon his mission 
to Japan without any knowledge whatsoever of the Japanese 
language! Although that language is one of the most dif- 
ficult in the world, and wholly unlike any spoken then or 
now in Europe, yet that fact was of trifling consequence to 
such a man as the Jesuits represent Xavier to have been. 
He undertook this mission as if nothing were in the way, 
relying, as may be inferred from the Jesuit accounts, upon 
his miraculous powers to convert to Christianity an idola- 
trous people he had never seen, and of whom the world at 
that time knew but little. It is solemnly averred that in 
forty days ( !) he acquired a sufficient knowledge of the Jap- 
anese language to translate into it the Apostles' Creed, and 
an exposition of its meaning by himself. With this he be- 
gan to preach, and "converted a great number." Still the 
intensity of his zeal made him impatient, and, being unwill- 
ing to await the slow process of appealing to the intelligence 
of the Japanese people, he resorted again to the familiar ex- 
pedient of miracles, which had accomplished so much in 
India. Accordingly, we are told that, "by his blessing, a 
child's body, which was swelled and deformed, was made 
straight and beautiful; and, by his prayers, a leper was 
healed, and a pagan young maid of quality, that had been 



» Butler, p. 614. 



164 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

dead a whole day, was raised to life." 8 The Jesuits have 
never hesitated to assign to Xavier, as they did to Loyola, 
the performance of some miracle, when anything had to be 
done that could be accomplished in no other way. The ag- 
gregate number of miracles attributed to them exceed all 
that are recorded in the Gospels. And neither Xavier nor 
Loyola ever hesitated to avow their authority to perform 
them, in verification of the Jesuit doctrine that God had 
transferred his divine attributes to each of them. 

Such recitals are calculated to tax the patience of en- 
lightened readers of this day; but without them it is not 
possible to obtain accurate knowledge of the record the 
Jesuits have made up to inform the world of the glorious 
achievements of their society, and to keep out of view the 
enormities for which they have been, in the course of their 
history, condemned by every Christian nation and people of 
Europe. They are necessary also to a proper understanding 
why Xavier was beatified and canonized ; for these and 
other kindred fables were held to be sufficiently attested to 
cause his name to be enrolled among the saints. 

The difficulty of conveying to the minds of the Japanese 
people any proper idea of God, when their language con- 
tained no word to express it, has already been suggested 
with regard to India. He told them, says Butler, that 
" Deos" meant God. But it is impossible that this or any 
other single word can so signify the Deity as to convey to an 
ignorant, idolatrous people any just conception of the Creator 
of the world, or of his Divine attributes, or of their own re- 
sponsibilities to him either in life or death. But the won- 
derful exploits of Xavier were not balked at this or any 
other point. The "gift of tongues" had once been given to 
him, whereby he was enabled to preach to any people with- 
out any previous knowledge of their language. This gift, 
however, as we have seen, was only a " transient favor," 
granted for a season, or some special occasion, and taken 

8 Butler, p. 615. 



. JESUIT INFLUENCE IN INDIA. 165 

away. And, notwithstanding, in consequence of this, it had 
become necessary that he should learn the Japanese language 
in forty days, so as to be able to speak and write it, it still 
became necessary also that he should again have the power 
conferred upon him to understand and speak all languages. 
Consequently, we learn from Butler that " at Amanguchi 
God restored to St. Francis the gift of tongues ; for he preached 
often to the Chinese merchants who traded there, in their 
mother tongue, which he had never learned. " 9 To appreciate 
the character of this statement, it should be borne in mind 
that, at that time, he had never visited China. And it is 
proper to observe that, notwithstanding this providential 
preparation for missionary labors in that country, he never 
did visit there. 

It converts serious things into mockery to pretend that 
God conferred this gift upon Xavier in order to fit him 
specially for the conversion of the Chinese, and yet that he 
so disposed his providences with reference to him that he 
was never able to enter that empire, or to hold direct inter- 
course with its people. If it had been the Divine decree that 
he should be set apart for this great work by this miraculous 
preparation, no earthly impediment would have been likely 
to arrest him, or keep him out of China; for God's fixed 
purposes are not subject to fluctuation to suit the exigencies 
of human affairs. But, notwithstanding he made several 
earnest efforts to get there, he signally failed in all of them. 
He returned from Japan to India, and, after remaining a 
short time at Goa, resorted to the expedient of attempting 
an entrance into China by indirection, because the authori- 
ties there were inimical to the Portuguese. He conceived the 
idea of procuring the organization of a diplomatic mission, 
and having himself attached to it, so that, by this means, he 
could enter the country. This plan having failed, he en- 
deavored to accomplish his object " secretly," says Butler, 
making the effort to be landed somewhere upon the Chinese 



9 Butler, p. 616. 



166 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

coast, " where no houses were in view." Every step he 
took, however, proved abortive, and he died before reaching 
China, thus leaving wholly unaccomplished what the Jesuits 
allege was the foreordained purpose of Providence. 

The death of Xavier occurred in 1552, and his remains 
were taken to Goa about three months after, when, accord- 
ing to the Jesuit account, his flesh "was found ruddy and 
fresh-colored, like a man who is in sweet repose!" When it 
was cut, the blood ran! And so necessary is it deemed by 
the Jesuits that his body shall appear to have been abso- 
lutely incorruptible — as an argument to prove that their 
society is under the special protection and guardianship of 
God — it is seriously affirmed that "the holy corpse exhaled 
an odor so fragrant and delightful that the most exquisite 
perfume came nothing near it." When the body reached 
Malacca, a pestilence then wasting the city, suddenly ceased, 
the effect alone of its mere presence! It was transported to 
Goa — "entire, fresh, and still exhaling a sweet odor" — and 
deposited in the church of the Jesuit college he had dex- 
trously obtained from the Franciscan monks. Upon this 
occasion we are told that "several blind persons recovered 
their sight, and others, sick of palsies and other diseases, 
their health and the use of their limbs!" His relics, by 
order of the King of Portugal, were visited in 1774 — one 
hundred and ninety-two years after his death — when "the 
body was found without the least bad smell, and seemed 
environed with a kind of shining brightness, and the face, 
hands, breast, and feet had not suffered the least alteration 
or symptom of corruption !" 10 

In view of the universal experience of mankind and the 
enlightenment of the present age, it is difficult to treat the 
foregoing statements seriously, they are so palpably the 
product of Jesuit imposture. And yet they are published 
in this country, and recommended as positive truths, by the 
highest ecclesiastical authority, as if some intelligent provi- 



i° Butler, pp. 620-628. 



JES UIT INFL UENCE IN INDIA. 167 

dential object would be accomplished by believing them. 
Notwithstanding, however, that every man of common sense 
will reject them, they are indispensable to a proper under- 
standing of the methods employed by the Jesuits in setting 
forth the claims of their society to providential favor. And 
although the vagaries of the wildest enthusiasts are more 
credible, because they do not sport with sacred things, their 
recital puts us in possession of some of the means of un- 
raveling the nets this wonderful society has cunningly woven. 



CHAPTER X. 

IN PARAGUAY. 

The Jesuits had a fairer and better field for the display 
of their peculiar characteristics, and for the successful estab- 
lishment of the principles of their constitution, during the 
existence of the Government founded by them in Paraguay, 
than ever fell to the lot of any other society or select body 
of men. It is not too late to try them by the results they 
then achieved, so as to assure ourselves of what might rea- 
sonably be expected if the modern nations should so far for- 
get themselves as to allow that sad and disastrous experiment 
to be repeated. 

After the Portuguese obtained possession of Brazil, they 
inaugurated measures necessary to bring the natives under 
their dominion. The problem was not of easy solution. 
The Indians had no conception of the principles of inter- 
national law, which the leading nations had established to 
justify the subjugation cf the weak by the strong, and con- 
sequently had to be brought by slow degrees under such in- 
fluences as should persuade them to believe that their con- 
querors were benefactors, and not enemies. The pretense of 
title, based upon the grant of the Pope Alexander VI, was 
not openly avowed. If it had been, the native population, 
in all probability, would have united in sufficient numbers 
to drive the invaders into the sea. Pacific means of some 
sort had to be employed, so as to delude the multitude of 
natives into a condition of apparent but false security. 

Spain had also acquired possessions in other parts of 

South America, and the methods of colonization adopted by 

the two Governments were substantially the same. Charles 

V of Spain and John III of Portugal were both religious 

168 



IN PARAGUAY. 169 

fanatics, and although their chief purpose was to obtain 
wealth from the mines of America, each of them professed 
to desire, at the same time, the civilization of the natives. 
Hence, as this could not be accomplished without the influ- 
ences of Christianity, all the expeditions sent out by them to 
the New World were accompanied by ecclesiastics, and were 
therefore under the patronage and auspices of the Church of 
Rome. The controlling idea of the period was that the 
Church and the State should remain united, so that whereso- 
ever the latter should obtain temporal and political control, 
the former should be constantly present to decide and direct 
everything pertaining to faith and morals; that is, to keep 
both the State and the people in obedience to the Church. 
With these objects in view, missionaries were sent out by 
the Church with the first Spanish and Portuguese adven- 
turers, and every step was avowedly taken in the name of 
Christianity. So deeply was this sentiment embedded in 
every mind that the memory of some favorite saint was per- 
petuated in the names of nearly all the newly-established 
cities. These missionaries were taken mainly from the an- 
cient monastic orders — the Dominicans, Franciscans, etc. — 
and had been regarded by the popes for many years as not 
only the most faithful, but the most efficient coadjutors of 
the Church in the work of extending Christianity over the 
world. We have elsewhere seen that the Jesuits did not 
sympathize with this belief, and that. Loyola had urged upon 
the pope the necessity of creating his new society upon the 
express ground that these ancient orders had become both 
inefficient and corrupt. When the New World, therefore, 
was about to be opened before them, the followers of Loyola 
endeavored to seize the occasion to supplant the monkish 
orders, if possible, and take into their own hands exclusively 
the dissemination of Christian influences among the native 
populations. In this respect the Jesuits displayed more zeal 
for their own success than for that of the Church, and made 
the cause of Christianity secondary to their own interests. 
The history of their missions in South America will abun- 



170 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

dantly show this, as it will also display their insatiable ambi- 
tion and unparalleled superciliousness. . 

The firt Jesuists were sent to South America by the 
King of Portugal. They found a large district of country 
washed by the waters of the Rio de la Plata and its tribu- 
taries, which had not been reached by either the Spaniards 
or the Portuguese, but remained in the exclusive possession 
of the Indians, who had never felt the influence of European 
civil izatiou. The natives generally had been treated by the 
invaders with extreme cruelty, having been often reduced to 
slavery and forced to submit to a variety of oppressions and 
indignities. All the resources of the country susceptible of 
being converted into wealth were seized upon to supply the 
royal treasuries of the Christian kings who tyrannized over 
them. The whole history of that period shows that, unless 
some counteracting influences had been introduced, those 
who professed to desire the civilization of the natives would, 
in all probability, have added to the degradation and misery 
in which they were found when first discovered. The Jesuits 
desired to apply some corrective, and there is no reason why 
the sincerity of their first missionaries in this respect should 
be suspected. It can not be justly charged against them that 
they were disposed to treat the native populations with 
cruelty, or to do otherwise than subject them to the influ- 
ences of the Jesuit system of education and government. 
Whatsoever faults of management are properly attributable 
to them — and there are many — are easily traceable to that 
system itself, which, from its very nature, has always been, 
and must continue to be, inflexible. Inasmuch as blind and 
uninquiring obedience to the superior is the most prominent 
and fundamental principle of the society, everything, in 
either government or religion or morals, must bend to that, 
or break. There is no half-way ground — no compromise — 
nothing but obedience. Everything is reduced to a common 
level, leaving individuals without the least sense of personal 
responsibility except to those in authority above them. For 
these reasons, it is necessary to remember, whilst examining 



IN PARAGUAY. 171 

the course and influences of the Jesuits in Paraguay, that 
whatsoever transpired was in obedience to the command of 
the superior in Rome, who held no personal intercourse with 
the natives, and whose animating and controlling purpose was 
to grasp the entire dominion over the New World in his own 
hands. It was chargeable to the constitution and organiza- 
tion of the society, which, as already explained, so em- 
phatically embodies the principle of absolute monarchism as 
to place it necessarily in antagonism with every form of 
liberal and popular government. If the Government they 
established in Paraguay, and maintained for one hundred and 
fifty years, had not been monarchical, it could not have had 
Jesuit paternity or approval. If, from any cause, at any 
period of its existence, it had become otherwise by the intro- 
duction of popular features, it would have encountered 
Jesuit resistance. Monarchism and Jesuitism are twin sisters. 
Popular liberty and Jesuitism can not exist in unity ; the* 
former may tolerate the latter, but the latter can not be 
reconciled without exterminating everything but itself. 
Whatsoever institutions existed, therefore, in Paraguay whilst 
the country was under the exclusive dominion of the Jesuits, 
must be held to have been in precise conformity to the 
Jesuit constitution, and of such a character as the society 
would yet establish wheresoever they possessed the power 
either to frame new institutions or to change existing ones. 

. The Jesuit idea of exclusiveness and superiority influ- 
enced the conduct of their missionaries in Paraguay as else- 
where. But for this, different results might have ensued. 
If they had been content to recognize the monastic orders as 
equally important and meritorious as their own in the field 
of missionary labor, and the ancient machinery of the Church 
as retaining its capacity for effectiveness in spreading Chris- 
tianity throughout the world — if, in other words, they had 
been content to recognize any merit as existing elsewhere 
than among themselves — the natives might have been sub- 
jected to a very different destiny from that which, in the 
end, overwhelmed them. But they were not permitted, by 



172 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the nature and character of their order, to entertain any such 
feelings, or to cherish any ideas of success other than those 
which promised to inure to their own advancement. Ac- 
cordingly we find them — as explained by one of their modern 
defenders of high celebrity — basing their claim to exclusive 
jurisdiction over the natives of Paraguay upon the express 
ground that the ecclesiastical influences sent out under the 
auspices of the Church and the patronage of the Spanish 
and Portuguese kings, had become injurious rather than 
beneficial to the natives, in consequence of the most flagrant 
corruption. In explanation of the course pursued by the 
Jesuit missionaries, he says: "One of the first experiences 
of the missioners was, that it was in vain to hope for any 
permanent fruit among the Indians, unless they were sepa- 
rated from the evil influences of the Europeans, who swarmed 
into the New World, carrying with them all the vices of the 
Old, and adding to them the licentiousness and cruelty 
which the freedom of a new country and the hopes of speedy 
riches bring with them." ' This same author also speaks 
of "the hordes of adventurers who flocked over to the New 
World, the scum of the great cities of Europe," in order to 
show that by intercourse with them the natives knew "little 
more of the Christian name than the vices of those who pro- 
fessed it." 2 To let it be known that "lay adventurers" 
are not alone referred to, he mentions expressly the " worldly 
and ambitions ecclesiastics and religious," who were " forget- 
ful of the spirit of their calling, or apostates from their 
rule." 3 He casts a variety of aspersions upon the char- 
acters of the Bishops of Assumption and of Buenos Ay res, and 
maintains the proposition with earnestness, that if the Indians 
were allowed to have unrestrained intercourse with the 
Spaniards, "they would derive the worst consequences from 
their bad example, which is entirely opposed to the princi- 
ples of morality." 4 

1 The Suppression of the Society of Jesus in the Portuguese Do- 
minions. By the Rev. Alfred Weld, "of the Society of Jesus." 
London, 1877. Page 24. *lbid., p. 30. Ubid., p. 33. *lbid., p. 42. 



IN PARAGUAY. 173 

In this the Jesuits displayed their wonderful astuteness, 
and it may be supposed that they employed these and other 
kindred allegations with effect in Spain, inasmuch as they 
succeeded in obtaining from the king a special " prohibition 
for Europeans to set foot in" Paraguay, so that they could 
thereby secure exclusive control of the natives and bring 
them under Jesuit influences alone, independent of the 
monastic orders and the ecclesiastical authorities of the 
Church. 5 This was a great stroke of policy upon their part, 
because by ignoring the Church, its ecclesiastics, and the 
monastic orders, they were enabled to assume prerogatives 
of the most extravagant character, and to hold themselves 
out to the natives as the only Europeans worthy of obedi- 
ence and the only true representatives of Christian civiliza- 
tion. Not only, therefore, in the manner of securing the 
royal approval of their exclusive pretensions, but in the 
character of the Government established by them, did they 
exhibit their chief characteristics of ambition, vanity, and 
superciliousness — characteristics they have never lost. 

The Government established by them in Paraguay was 
essentially monarchical. It could not have been otherwise 
under the principles of their constitution. Under the false 
name of a Christian republic, it was, to all intents and pur- 
poses, a theocratic State, so constructed as to free it from all 
European influences except such as emanated from their 
superior at Rome. All the intercourse they had with the 
Church and the pope was through him, and whatsoever com- 
mands he gave were uninquiringly obeyed by them, without 
stopping to investigate or concerning themselves in the least 
to know whether the Church and the pope approved or disap- 
proved them. In order to impress the natives with the idea of 
their independence and of their superiority over the monastic 
orders and the Church ecclesiastics, they practiced the most 
artful means to persuade them to hold no intercourse with 

5 The Suppression of trie Society of Jesus iu the Portuguese Do- 
minions. By the Eev. Alfred Weld, "of the Society of Jesus." 
London, 1877. Page 42. 



174 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

either Spaniards or Portuguese, upon the ground that they 
could not do so without encountering the example of their 
vices and immoralities. The unsuspecting Indians were 
easily seduced by acts of kindness, and the result was that, in 
the course of a brief period, they succeeded in establishing a 
number of what were called Reductions — or, more properly 
speaking, villages — with multitudes of Indians assembled 
about them; the whole aggregating, in the end, several 
hundred thousand. These constituted the Jesuit State, and 
were all, by the mere ceremony of baptism, brought under 
Jesuit dominion. At each Reduction the natives were 
allowed to select a secular magistracy, with limited and un- 
important powers over such temporal affairs as could be 
iutrusted to them without impairing the theocratic feature of 
the Government. But in order to provide against the possi- 
bility of permitting even these few temporal affairs from 
being conducted independently of them, they adopted the 
precaution of providing that, before any important decisions 
were carried iuto effect, they should obtain their sanction — 
as " spiritual shepherds." There never was anywhere a 
more thorough and complete blending of Church and State 
together. 

Although this new State was established under the pre- 
tense that it was necessary to protect the natives against the 
bad influences of the Spaniards and the Portuguese, the ap- 
proval of it by the King of Spain, Philip III, was obtained 
by the promise that "every adult must pay him the tribute 
of one dollar" — a consideration of chief importance with him. 
Philip IV was equally disposed to favor the Jesuits, presumably 
for the want of proper information ; for it would have required 
but little investigation at that time to have discovered that 
the only motive of the Jesuits for securing royal approbation 
in Europe was that they might ultimately acquire power to 
plot against European royalty itself when it should stand in 
the way of their ambition. To show how little obedience 
was paid to the public authorities of either Spain or 
Portugal, it is only necessary to observe that each Reduction 



IN PARAGUAY. 175 

was governed by a Jesuit father, supported by a vicar and a 
curate as assistants, but whose chief duty was espionage. 
This governing father was under the orders of a superior, 
who presided over a diocese of five or six parishes, the 
supervision and management of the whole being lodged in the 
hands of a provincial, who "received his orders direct from 
the general in Home." 6 If, therefore, the kings of Spain 
and Portugal supposed that the Jesuits in Portugal intended 
to pay fidelity to them, or to either of them, they were de- 
ceived — as, in the course of events, they discovered. They 
obeyed their general in Rome, and him alone. 

The praise ought not to be withheld from the Jesuits, 
that the natives who were thus brought under their influ- 
ences were better and more kindly treated than those who 
were compelled to submit to the dominion of Spaniards 
and Portuguese beyond the limits of Paraguay. They "par- 
took of their labors, of their amusements, of their joys, of 
their sorrows. They visited daily every house in which lay 
a sick person, whom they served as the kindest nurse, and 
to whom they seemed to be ministering genii." By these and 
other kindnesses they brought the Indians to look upon them 
with a feeling bordering upon idolatry. But whilst they 
were friends, they were also sovereigns, and "governed with 
absolute and unquestioned authority." 7 This was a neces- 
sary and indispensable part of their system of government, 
which embodied the Jesuit idea of a Christian republic. It 
was in everything pertaining to the management of public 
affairs an absolute monarchy, with all its powers centered in 
the general at Rome, whose authority was accepted as equal 
to that of God, and to whose command obedience was ex- 
acted from all. 

Apart from this governing authority, universal equality 
prevailed. The priuciples of socialism or communism — very 
much as now understood — governed all the Reductions. 



6 History of the Jesuits. By Greisinger. Page 140. 
*Nicolini, p. 302. 



176 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

Everything necessary to the material comfort and prosperity 
of the Indians was in common. Each family had a portion 
of land set apart for cultivation. They also learned trades, 
and many of them, both men and women, became experts. 
But the earnings of the whole were deposited in common 
storehouses at each Reduction, and distributed by the Jesuits 
in such portions to each individual as necessity required. 
"Even meat was portioned from the public slaughter-houses 
in the same way." The surplus produce remaining after 
these distributions was sent to Europe, and sold or exchanged 
for wares and merchandise, solely at the discretion of the 
Jesuits. Everything was conducted in obedience to them, 
and nothing contrary to their orders was tolerated. Rigid 
rules of conduct and hours of labor were prescribed, and the 
violators of them were subject to corporal punishment. 
Houses of worship, colleges, and palatial residences for the 
Jesuit fathers, were built by the common labor and at the 
expense of the common treasury. Suffrage was universal ; 
but " the sanction of the Jesuits was necessary to the validity 
of the election." In fact, says Nicolini, "the Jesuits sub- 
stituted themselves for the State or community" 8 — a fact 
which fully establishes the monarchical and theocratic char- 
acter of the Government. 

In order to teach the confiding Indians that obedience to 
authority was their chiefest duty, they were subjected to 
rules of conduct and intercourse which were enforced with 
the strictest severity. They were watched in everything, 
the searching eyes of the Jesuits being continually upon 
them. They constituted, in fact, a state of society reaching 
the Jesuit ideal completely; that is, docile, tractable, sub- 
missive, obedient, without the least real semblance of man- 
hood. Having thus completed their subjugation, energetic 
measures were adopted to render any change in their condi- 
tion impossible. For this purpose care was taken to exclude 
all other than Jesuit influences, and to sow the seeds of dis- 



8 Nicolini, pp. 303-304. 



IN PARAGUAY; 111 

affection towards everything European, the object being to 
surround them with a high wall of ignorance and supersti- 
tion, which no European influences could overleap, and 
within which their authority would be unbounded. They 
were instructed that the Spaniards and the Portuguese were 
their enemies, that the ecclesiastics and monkish missionaries 
sent over by the Church were unworthy of obedience or imi- 
tation, and that the only true religion was that which ema- 
nated from their society and had their approval. If these 
simple-minded people were taught anything about the 
Church, it was with the view of convincing them that the 
Jesuits represented all its power, authority, and virtue, and 
that whatsoever did not conform to their teachings was sin- 
ful and heretical. If they were told anything about the 
pope, it was to represent him as inferior to their general, 
who was to be regarded by them as the only infallible repre- 
sentative of God upon earth. That all other ideas should 
be excluded from their minds, they were not permitted to 
hold any intercourse whatsoever with Europeans ; for fear, 
undoubtedly, they might hear that there was a Church at 
Rome, and a pope higher than their general. They were 
not allowed to speak any language but their own, so as to 
render it impossible to acquire any ideas or opinions except 
such as could be expressed by means of its limited number 
of inexpressive words; that is, to keep them entirely and 
exclusively under Jesuit influences. To sum up the whole, 
without further detail, the Indians were regarded as minors 
under guardianship, and in this condition they remained for 
one hundred and fifty years, without the possibility of social 
and national development. They were saved, it is true, 
from the miseries of Portuguese slavery, but kept in such a 
condition of inferiority and vassalage as unfitted them for 
independent citizenship. Their limbs were unchained; but 
their minds were " cabined, cribbed, confined," within 
bounds too narrow for matured thought, sentiment, or 
reason. 

It would not be fair to say that the first Jesuit mission- 

12 



178 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

aries to Paraguay may not have been animated by the de- 
sire to improve the condition of the Indians, or to withhold 
from them the meed of praise justly due for the humanity 
of their motives. It is undoubtedly true, as already inti- 
mated, that they did shield them from many of the cruelties 
to which they had been subjected under the Spanish and 
the Portuguese adventurers, who overran large portions of 
South America iu the search after wealth. But it can not 
be too indelibly impressed upon our minds, in this age, that 
they acted in strict obedience to the Jesuit system, which 
permitted no departure from absolute monarchism, and cen- 
tered all the duties of citizenship in obedience to themselves 
as the sole representatives of the only authority that was or 
could be legitimate. And not only did their strict adherence 
to their system make it necessary for them to hold the Indi- 
ans in subjugation and treat them as inferior subjects, but it 
involved them, at last, in collisions with the Spaniards and 
Portuguese, and obliged them to treat the latter especially 
as enemies, and to impress this fact upon the minds of the 
whole Indian population. The consequence of this was to 
create an independent and rebellious Government within the 
Portuguese dominions, which necessarily brought the Jesuits 
in conflict with the legitimate authority of the Portuguese 
Government. The Jesuits foresaw this, and prepared for it. 
It is a fair inference from all the contemporaneous facts that 
they desired it. At all events they subjected the Indians at 
the Reductions to military training and discipline, so as to 
be prepared for such emergencies as might arise out of their 
relations with both the Spaniards and the Portuguese. One 
would suppose that in a Government so far separated from 
the rest of the world, and governed by those who professed 
to be laboring alone for "the greater glory of God," the 
arts of peace would be chiefly, if not exclusively, cultivated. 
But the successors of the first Jesuit missionaries thought 
otherwise. Consequently, besides refusing to allow the Indi- 
ans any intercourse with the Europeans, they would not 
permit them even to leave the Reductions without permis- 



IN PARAGUAY. 179 

sion, or to receive any impressions except those emanating 
from themselves, or to do anything not dictated by them. 
The result was what they designed, that the Indians came to 
look upon all Europeans, whether ecclesiastic or lay, as ene- 
mies, and the Jesuit as their only friends. They readily 
engaged, therefore, in the manufacture of arms and ammuni- 
tion, and submitted to military discipline until they became 
a formidable army, subject, of course, to the command of 
their Jesuit superiors. The sequel of Jesuit history proves 
that in all this they were unconsciously creating an antago- 
nism which, in the end, overwhelmed them. 

A violent feud sprang up between the Jesuits and the 
Franciscan monks, which undoubtedly arose out of the claim 
of superiority and exclusiveness set up and persisted in by 
the former. It may well be inferred that the Jesuits were 
chiefly to blame for this feud, for the reason that the Fran- 
ciscans retained the confidence of the Church authorities, and 
the Jesuits did not. At all events, however, they were in 
open enmity with each other, and prosecuted their contro- 
versy with an exceeding degree of bitterness upon both sides. 
A distinguished citizen of the United States, who represented 
this country as Minister to Paraguay, alluding to this fact, 
says : ' ' The Franciscan priests in the capital regarded them 
[the Jesuits] with envy, suspicion, and jealousy. These last 
fomented the animosity of the people against them, so that 
Government, priests, and people regarded with favor, rather 
than otherwise, the destruction of the missions, and the ex- 
pulsion of their founders." 9 Notwithstanding these hostile 
relations, however, between the Jesuits and the Franciscans, 
and the disturbed condition of affairs existing between the 
former and the Portuguese authorities, neither the pope nor 
the King of Spain withdrew their patronage entirely from 
the Jesuits for some years, and not until it was made mani- 
fest that they had become an independent power, which 
might, if not checked, result in complications injurious alike 



9 History of Paraguay. By Washburn. Vol. I, p. 87. 



180 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

to the Church and the State. But the time arrived, after 
a while, when it became necessary to impose severe restraints 
upon their ambition, and to teach them that neither the 
powers of Church nor State were concentrated in their hands. 
They were required to learn — what they had seemed not be- 
fore to have been conscious of — that the authority they exer- 
cised in Paraguay was usurped, and that if they desired to 
continue there as a society, they must submit to be held in 
proper subordination. Being unable or unwilling to realize 
this, they invited results which they manifestly had not an- 
ticipated. 

When the protracted controversy between Spain and 
Portugal, about the boundaries of their respective possessions 
in South America, reached an adjustment, it furnished an 
occasion for testing the obedience of the Jesuits to royal au- 
thority. The two Governments, after the usual delay in such 
matters, came to an amicable understanding, and arranged 
the boundaries to their mutual satisfaction. It placed a por- 
tion of the Jesuit missions under the jurisdiction of the Por- 
tuguese, which they had supposed to belong to Spain. The 
Jesuits refused to submit to this, and inaugurated the neces- 
sary measures to resist it, being determined, if they could 
prevent it, not to submit to the dominion of Portugal. Their 
preference for Spain was because of the fact that the king 
of that country was more favorably inclined to them than 
the Portuguese king. But the history of the controversy 
justifies the belief that they would not even have submitted 
to the former unresistingly, inasmuch as it had undoubtedly 
become their fixed purpose to retain the independence they 
had long labored to establish, by maintaining their theocratic 
form of government. They had been so accustomed to auto- 
cratic rule over the natives, that they could not become rec- 
onciled to the idea of surrendering it to any earthly power. 
In this instance, however, they encountered an adversary flf 
whose courage and capacity they had not the least concep- 
tion, and whom they found, in a brief period, capable of in- 



IN PARAGUAY. 181 

flicting a death-blow upon the society. This was Sebastian 
Cavalho, Marquis of Pombal, who was the chief counselor of 
the Portuguese king. 

Cavalho — better known as Pombal — and the King of Por- 
tugal, were both faithful members of the Roman Church, and 
conducted the Government in obedience to its requirements. 
But neither of them was disposed to submit to the dictation 
of the Jesuits of Paraguay with regard to the question of 
boundary — which was entirely political — or submit to their 
rebellion against legitimate authority. Such a question did 
not admit of compromise or equivocation. It presented a 
vital issue they could neither avoid nor postpone, without 
endangering the Government and forfeiting their own self- 
respect. Consequently, they inaugurated prompt and ener- 
getic measures to suppress the threatened insurrection of the 
Jesuits before it should be permitted to ripen into open and 
armed resistance. From that time forward the controversy 
constantly increased in violence. The intense hatred of 
Pombal by the Jesuits has colored their opinions to such an 
extent that . they deny to him either talents or merit, and, 
inasmuch as they charge all the ensuing results to him, he is 
pictured by them more as a monster of iniquity than as a 
statesman of acknowledged ability. All this, however, should 
count for nothing in deciding the real merits of the contro- 
versy. The whole matter is resolved into this simple propo- 
sition — that it was the duty of the Government to vindicate 
and maintain its own authority in the face of Jesuit oppo- 
sition. It had nothing to do with the Church, nor the 
Church with it. It did not involve any question of faith, 
but was confined solely and entirely to secular and temporal 
affairs. And if, under these circumstances, Pombal had 
quietly permitted the Jesuits to defy the Government and 
consummate their object by successful rebellion against its 
authority, he would have won from Jesuit pens the brightest 
and most glowing praise, but his name would have gone into 
history as the betrayer of his country. 



182 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

With the foregoing facts impressed upon his mind, the 
reader will be prepared to appreciate the subsequent events 
which fed to the expulsion of the Jesuits from all the Roman 
Catholic nations of Europe, and finally to the suppression 
and abolition of the society, as the only means of defense 
against its exactions and enormities. 



CHAPTER XI. 

THE PORTUGUESE AND THE JESUITS. 

At the period referred to in the last chapter the Jesuits 
were held in low esteem everywhere in Europe. They were 
severely censured, not alone by Government authorities, but 
by the great body of the Christian people, more especially 
those who desired to save the Roman Church from their dan- 
gerous and baneful influences. The leading Roman Catholic 
Governments were all incensed against them, and it only re- 
quired some master spirit, some man of courage and ability, 
to excite universal indignation against them. Protestants 
had comparatively little to do with the matter — nothing, in- 
deed, but to make public sentiment somewhat more distinct 
and emphatic. 

Pombal understood thoroughly the character of the adver- 
sary he was about to encounter — the adroit artifices which 
the Jesuits, collectively and individually, were accustomed 
to practice, and by which they had often succeeded in ob- 
taining assistance from unexpected quarters. Therefore he 
resolved at the outset not to temporize with them, but to 
put in operation immediately a series of measures of the 
most active and energetic character. He may not have 
known that the other Roman Catholic Governments would 
unite with that of Portugal, but he must have seen ground 
for believing that they would, in the general displeasure 
they exhibited at the conduct of the Jesuits throughout 
Europe. Howsoever this may have been, he saw plainly his 
own line of duty toward the Portuguese Government, and had 
not only the necessary courage, but the ability to pursue it. 
A royal council was held at the palace of the King of Portu- 
gal in 1757, at which he suggested " the imperative neces- 

183 



184 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

sity of removing the Jesuits from their posts of confessors to 
the royal family," for the reason that the controversy in 
South America could not be satisfactorily settled, if at all, 
s o long as they remained in a condition to influence the 
action and opinions of the king in any degree whatsoever. 1 
He knew perfectly well how ingeniously they had wormed 
themselves into the confidence of kings, so that by becoming 
their confessors they should not only obtain a knowledge of 
the secrets of State, but so to influence the policy and action 
of Governments as to promote their own interests. And 
like a sagacious and skillful statesman, as he undoubtedly 
was, he saw at a glance how necessary it was that they 
should not be permitted to have further access to the king. 
The Jesuits represent the king as having been unwilling to 
assent to this proposition ; but that is not of the least conse- 
quence, because, as they admit, he signed " the decree which 
excluded all Jesuits from their office of confessors of the court." 2 
This was a terrible blow to them — perhaps the first of a seri- 
ous character they had ever encountered. It was made the 
more serious by the fact that Portugal was recognized as a 
thoroughly religious country, and sincerely devoted to the 
Church of Rome. Whatsoever may have been its immedi- 
ate effect upon the Jesuits, it left no ground for retreat or 
equivocation upon either side, but placed the contestants in 
direct and open hostility, each with drawn swords. From 
that time forward the conflict, on the part of the Jesuits, 
was one of life or death, and they fought it with a despera- 
tion born of that belief. 

To justify itself, and to explain to the European nations 
the reasons which influenced it, the Portuguese Government 
caused to be prepared a statement of grievances, wherein the 
course of the Jesuits " in the Spanish and Portuguese do- 
minions of the New World, and of the war which they had 
carried on against the armies of the two crowns," were set 
forth. It is insinuated that Pombal was the author of this 



1 Weld, p. 94. 2 Ibid. 



THE PORTUGUESE AND THE JESUITS. 185 

pamphlet, but no evidence of that has been produced. It 
does uot matter whether he was or not, inasmuch as it 
amounted to such an arraignment of the Jesuits as gave tone 
to the public sentiment of Europe, and influenced the course 
of all the Governments toward the society. Viewed in this 
light, it becomes of the utmost importance, inasmuch as we 
may rightfully regard as true, even without special investi- 
gation, whatsoever influences the action of Governments and 
communities, and can not safely accept in opposition to it 
what interested parties — such as the Jesuits were — may assert 
to the contrary. The substance of this statement is con- 
tained in the work of Weld, one of the most earnest of the 
Jesuit defenders. It is in the nature of an indictment 
against the Jesuits, preferred by one of the leading Roman 
Catholic Governments of Europe, and on that account is 
both important and instructive. Abuse and vituperation — 
in the use of which the Jesuits are trained as experts — are 
no answer to it. 

After alleging that the power of the Jesuits had so in- 
creased as to render it evident that there must be war be- 
tween them and the Government in Paraguay, it proceeds 
to affirm "that they were laboring sedulously to undermine 
the good understanding existing between the Governments 
of Portugal and Spain," and that "their machinations were 
carried on from the Plata to the Rio Grande." It then em- 
bodies in a few expressive words, as given by the Jesuit 
Weld, these serious charges : 

" That they had under them thirty-one great popula. 
tions, producing immense riches to the society, while the 
people themselves were kept in the most miserable slavery ; 
that no Spaniard or Portuguese, were he even governor or 
bishop, was ever admitted into the Reductions ; that, ' with 
strange deceit,' the Spanish language was absolutely forbid- 
den; that the Indians were trained to an unlimited, blind 
obedience, kept in the most ' extraordinary ignorance/ and 
the most unsufferable slavery ever known, and under a com- 
plete despotism as to body and soul ; that they did not know 



186 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

there was any other sovereign in the world than the fathers, 
and knew nothing of the king, or any other law than the 
will of the ' holy fathers ;' that the Indians were taught that 
white laymen adored gold, had a devil in their bodies, were 
the enemies of the Indians, and of the images which they 
adored ; that they would destroy their altars, and offer sac. 
rifices of their women and infants; and they were conse- 
quently taught to kill white men wherever they could find 
them, and to be careful to cut off their heads, lest they 
should come to life again." 8 

One would scarcely suppose that, after this terrible ar- 
raignment of the Jesuits in Paraguay, there could be any 
other counts added to the indictment. But in order to ag- 
gravate these offenses and to explain their disloyalty to the 
Government — as we learn from the same Jesuit authority — 
they were also charged with opposing and resisting the treaty 
of boundary between Spain and Portugal ; with carrying on 
a war against the two Governments ; fortifying and defend- 
ing the passes leading to the Reductions with artillery; in- 
citing the Indians to revolt ; and with exhibiting an obsti- 
nate resistance to royal authority.* 

There has never been, in the civilized world, such an enu- 
meration of serious offenses charged against any body of 
men by so high and responsible authority as that of one of 
the leading Governments, as Portugal was. The modern 
reader can not avoid the expression of surprise when he real- 
izes that they were made by those who faithfully adhered to 
the Church of Rome, and against a society which professed 
to have been organized to promote "the greater glory of God," 
for the express reason that no existing order sufficiently did so. 

It is scarcely possible that such accusations as these would 
have been made without some justifying cause. If they were 
even exaggerated, the Government of Portugal must have 
obtained information from responsible sources sufficiently re- 
liable to authorize a searching investigation. That, undoubt- 



s Weld, pp. 96-97. * ibid. 



THE PORTUGUESE AND THE JESUITS. 187 

edly, was the object of Pombal and the king, not merely in 
explanation of their own official conduct, but to bring the 
conduct and attitude of the Jesuits to the notice of other 
Governments. Whatsoever the direct object they had in 
view, the charges thus formally made by them against the 
Jesuits led to a fierce and angry controversy. The Jesuits 
defended themselves with their accustomed violence, and it 
has required many pages to convey to the world the character 
of the maledictions visited by them upon the name and mem- 
ory of Pombal. To us of the present time these amount to 
very little, inasmuch as they are almost entirely supported 
by ex parte statements of those implicated by the Government, 
and which are entitled to no weight whatsoever against the 
general verdict ultimately rendered by the European nations, 
in obedience to public opinion. We can not accept the Jesuit 
theory that these nations were all misled by false accusations, 
or that the subsequent suppression of the society was the con- 
sequence of undue popular prejudices. It is not difficult to 
deceive individuals, but Governments and communities are 
not apt to fall into serious errors. The collective judgments 
of whole populations are seldom wrong. 

It was natural that the Christians of Europe should 
become, not only interested, but in some degree excited, 
when they came to know the character of the charges 
made against the Jesuits by the authority of the Portuguese 
Government. Many of them desired to look favorably upon 
the order on account of the relations they supposed it to 
bear to the Church. The Eoman ecclesiastics were divided, 
some attacking and others defending it. It became neces- 
sary, therefore, that the matter should be brought to the at- 
tention of the pope, in order that the final judgment should 
be pronounced by him, inasmuch as they were considered a 
religious order, and, consequently, within the proper juris- 
diction of the Church. With this view, Pombal, in behalf 
of the Government of Portugal, forwarded an official dis- 
patch to Rome, whereby the pope was informed of the 
causes of complaint against them. The Jesuits say this dis- 



188 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

patch is filled with "libels;" but this is to be attributed 
chiefly to their hatred of Pombal, to whom they, of course, 
assign the authorship. Nevertheless, it emanated from so 
responsible a quarter that the pope felt himself obliged to 
give it due consideration. He owed it to Portugal, no less 
than to the Church, to cause a searching investigation to be 
made, so that it might be ascertained whether the charges 
against the Jesuits were true or false. This could not have 
been avoided, even if he had desired it, and there is no evi- 
dence that he did. 

Benedict XIV was at that time pope, and his secretary 
of briefs was Cardinal Passionei, who had the reputation of 
being a man of integrity and ability. The initiatory steps 
had, consequently, to be taken by them. The pope, how- 
ever, was in infirm health, and the Jesuits insist that his 
sympathies were with them. This may probably have been 
so; but if it were, it furnishes no argument in their favor, 
because there was yet no evidence before him upon which 
any decision could have been based. The question he had 
then to decide was not whether they were innocent or guilty, 
but whether his duty did not require of him to take the nec- 
essary steps to ascertain what the truth really was. The 
charges were too serious to be passed over without this, and 
whatsoever the fact may have been with regard to his sym- 
pathies, Benedict XIV felt himself constrained to order, and 
did order, an investigation to be made. His brief to that 
effect was dated April 1, 1758, and addressed to Cardinal 
Saldanha by Passionei, as the pope's secretary, and com- 
manded that the charges made by the Portuguese Govern- 
ment should be thoroughly investigated, and the facts laid 
before him for his pontifical guidance. This was the inau- 
guration of a regular trial before a tribunal of acknowledged 
jurisdiction, and probably had the effect of suspending, in 
some degree, the public judgment to await his final decision. 
The Jesuits could not rightfully have objected to this course; 
and if it be true, as they insist, that the pope sympathized 
with them, they doubtless congratulated themselves upon 



THE PORTUGUESE AND THE JESUITS. 189 

his favorable inclination towards them. Whatsoever may 
have occurred afterwards, the investigation undoubtedly had 
an impartial beginning. On this account, the inquirer who 
desires to understand the history and character of the Jesuits, 
will be interested in its important details. 

Cardinal Saldanha was appointed ''visitor and reformer 
of the society," with full power to reform whatsoever abuses 
should be found to exist, and if, after investigation, "any 
grave matters" were discovered, he was required to report 
them to the pope, who would then decide what subsequent 
steps were to be taken. 5 The proceedings up to that point 
were therefore judiciously conducted. The death of Bene- 
dict XIV, however, within about a month after the date of 
this brief, passed it over to Clement XIII, his immediate 
successor. The Jesuits strive hard to show that although 
the pope referred in his brief to the reform of abuses, he 
did not intend thereby to signify that he had then decided 
that reforms were necessary. If they be allowed the ben- 
efit of this argument, it does not avail them against the fact 
that Cardinal Saldanha, after investigation, made a report 
in which "the fathers of the society in Portugal, and its 
dominions at the end of the earth, are declared, on the full- 
est information, guilty of every crime of worldly traffic that 
could disgrace the ecclesiastical state." 6 Whilst the special 
accusation here made had reference to the commercial traffic 
by which, in express violation of the rules of the society, 
the Jesuits had accumulated immense wealth in all parts of 
the world, and in direct violation of their vow of "extreme 
poverty," Pombal considered himself justified, with the asseut 
of the king, in requiring of the cardinal patriarch of Lisbon 
the issuance of an official order "to suspend from the sacred 
ministry, or preaching and hearing confessions, all the relig- 
ious of the Society of Jesus," in the Patriarchate of Lisbon. 
An order to that effect was accordingly issued by the patri- 
arch, which made the issue more serious and complicated 



6Weld, pp. 131-132. «76/rf., p. 138. 



190 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

than ever ; for it was a direct and practical procedure which 
everybody could understand. In their own defense, the 
Jesuits urge that the patriarch was intimidated by Porabal, 
and that, in consequence, he died of remorse within a month, 
aud confessed his error upon his death-bed. Such defenses 
as this are of no weight as arguments, in the face of actual 
and known occurrences, and especially when it is well known 
that the Jesuits are in the habit of resorting so frequently 
to deathbed repentances, obtained in private by themselves, 
as to excite general suspicion against them. Even, however, 
if their statement in this case is accepted as true, the order 
of the patriarch was carried into effect by the Government 
of Portugal, aud proved, in the end, to be the most fatal 
blow ever aimed at the society before that time. The pro- 
ceedings were not arrested by the death of the patriarch; 
for the vacancy made by it was immediately filled by the 
appointment of Cardinal Saldanha as his successor, which 
the Jesuits were compelled to construe as a censure of their 
society, inasmuch as he had already, in his report, charged 
them with crimes disgraceful to the "ecclesiastical state." 
As this appointment was made by the pope, it is at least to 
be inferred that he, up to this point, regarded the investiga- 
tion as fairly and impartially made. After his appointment 
as patriarch, Cardinal Saldanha banished the father superior 
of the Jesuit "Professed House," and caused such measures 
to be taken as resulted in the arrest of two Jesuits in Brazil, 
who were sent to Portugal and imprisoned. He appointed 
the Bishop of Para, in Brazil, as his ecclesiastical delegate to 
act in his name in South America. It would be impracti- 
cable to trace here all the events which followed; nor is it 
necessary, inasmuch as it is of far more importance to know 
the results than the series of details that led to them. The 
first important result that occurred in South America, under 
the ecclesiastical administration of the Bishop of Para, was 
the issuance by him of a decree whereby "he suspended 
all Jesuits in his diocese 'from the functions of the confes- 



THE PORTUGUESE AND THE JESUITS. 191 

sional and the pulpit." 7 He then continued to investigate 
the conduct of the Jesuits, and found that the ecclesiastics 
were divided with reference to them — some accusing and 
others defending them. Among those who opposed them 
were the Bishop of Olinda and the Bishop of San Sebastian, 
and these two prelates of the Church have been violently- 
denounced by the Jesuits on that account. This, however, 
is a fixed habit with them. They denounce all who oppose 
them, and bestow fulsome praises upon all their defenders. 
By this indiscriminate method they impair confidence in 
themselves, and make it difficult to decide how much of 
what they say shall be accepted and how much rejected. 
The safer plan is to follow the course of public events, giv- 
ing but little heed to the vituperation with which Jesuit 
works abound. 

There can be no doubt of the fact that Benedict XIV 
had authorized the cardinal visitor appointed by him to ap- 
ply all the measures necessary to reform the Jesuits, if, after 
investigation, he found any to be required. Thus the visitor 
was empowered to act for the Church and the pope; and, 
hence, the Jesuit resistance to his decrees was disobedience 
and insubordination. When Clement XIII became pope, he 
found just this condition of things existing, which not only 
increased his responsibilities, but added greatly to his em- 
barrassment. The Jesuits say that Cardinal Passionei un- 
justly impressed his mind with the idea that Benedict XIV 
had already decided that the reform of their society was 
necessary, and that whatsoever he did under the influence 
of this false impression should not be considered to their 
prejudice. This is barely possible; but whether he did or 
not is immaterial, since Clement XIII could not, under any 
circumstances, have found himself justified in either aban- 
doning or suspending the investigation which Benedict XIV 
had ordered. Nor could he have changed its course at any 

^ Weld, p. 148. 



192 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

time after he reached the pontificate — the interests at stake 
were too important, and the welfare of the Church was too 
deeply involved. At all events, the investigation was con- 
tinued under Clement XIII; and when the Jesuits realized 
that he could not be persuaded to abandon it, they endeav- 
ored to shift the issue by insisting that the hostility exhibited 
towards them had not arisen out of any of the things charged 
by the Government of Portugal, but had been created by 
the opposition of the " Jansenists and heretics" to them on 
account of their orthodox adherence to the Church of Rome. 
In this they exhibited their usual sagacity and cunning, evi- 
dently believing that it was the only means left them to 
bring over the body of the Roman Christians — the pope and 
all — to their side. It did, probably, tend somewhat to that, 
but fell far short of what they must have expected from it; 
for the further the investigation proceeded, the more unpop- 
ular their society became, not only on account of the pro- 
ceedings in Paraguay, but because of their interference with 
all the Governments of Europe. We see this in the meas- 
ures adopted in those Governments, and in the unanimity of 
the public sentiment which sustained them. The belief can 
not be indulged for a moment that these Governments and 
peoples — faithful and devoted as they always had been to 
the Church of Rome — were influenced by prejudices alone, 
and acted without some strong, controlling, and justifiable 
cause. It is worthy of repetition that Governments and 
communities do not thus act. And we shall soon see that 
there have been scarcely any other events in history so rati- 
fied by public approval as the expulsion of the Jesuits from 
the leading nations of Europe, and their final suppression 
and abolition by the pope. The evidence upon these sub- 
jects is so complete and overwhelming that it can not be set 
aside by volumes of eloquent denunciation, or weakened by 
Jesuitical sophistry. 

Whilst it is not proper to exclude from our consideration 
all that the Jesuit writers have said with reference to the 
period and controversy here referred to, it should be accepted 



THE PORTUGUESE AND THE JESUITS. 193 

with a great many grains of allowance. Their warmth and 
vehemence excite suspicion, indicating more of passion than 
comports with the quiet composure of innocence. They are 
not willing that the least credit shall be given to anything 
against them, and demand that whatsoever is said in their 
behalf shall be accepted as indisputably true. It is not 
difficult to see, however, that much of the matter offered by 
them as historic truth does not reach the dignity of impar- 
tial evidence, and ought not to be given any serious weight 
when in conflict with allegations proceeding from reputable 
and responsible sources. Within a recent period an elaborate 
defense of the society has been made by one of its leading 
and most learned members, and sent forth to the world as 
a conclusive and unanswerable vindication. It is contained 
in the volume so frequently referred to in this chapter, and 
alleged to be mainly founded upon what "writers of the 
society" have said. He supports his defense of this method 
of making history by introducing the statements of anony- 
mous authors which bear upon their face presumptive evi- 
dence that they were manufactured for the purpose by 
interested parties. He does not, of course, rely exclusively 
upon them, but, with true Jesuit ingenuity, has so inter- 
woven these irresponsible statements with less suspicious 
authorities as to give coloring and credibility to the whole. 
He says: "The details have been filled chiefly in from 
three well-known contemporary works, the names of the 
authors of which have not reached us"* Such a course indi- 
cates the partisan rather than the impartial chronicler of 
events, and an absence of the candor with which so important 
a discussion should be conducted. Anonymous statements 
should not be entirely discredited, because they may be true; 
but in searching after the "truth of history " they should 
avail nothing unless consistent with the general course of 
events, and then only because of that consistency. One 
illustration must serve. It is argued that Benedict XIV 



8 Weld. Introduction, pp. xxxviii — xxxix. 

13 



194 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

sympathized with the Jesuits, and was favorable to them at 
the time he appointed Saldanha as visitor with authority to 
investigate and reform, and yet this same pope was con- 
strained by their persistent disobedience to declare them 
"contumacious, crafty, and reprobate men." 9 

One reason why the papal authorities found so much 
difficulty in prosecuting the investigation of Jesuit affairs, 
was the impenetrable mystery which hung over the conduct 
of the society for more than two hundred years. By means 
of this secrecy and the concealment of the principles of their 
constitution, they were so enabled to compact their organiza- 
tion as to present a solid front to the world, with all its energies 
devoted alone to its own success. It was only when the 
constitution became known that Governments and society 
could defend against their machinations, which, as we have 
seen, were sufficiently well planned to defy even the pope 
and the Church functionaries appointed by him to inspect 
their conduct. Their persistency in refusing to expose to 
the public the principles of their constitution indicated, in 
the public judgment, that they feared a knowledge of them 
would add to the public indignation at their presumptuous- 
ness and vanity. And so decided was this refusal that it 
required the authority of the French Parliament — the 
highest judicial authority in that country — to drag the 
constitution from its hiding-place. One of their members 
had engaged in a mercantile adventure until he became 
bankrupt. Professing to have no property of- his own out 
of which his debts could be collected, his creditors brought 
suit against the society, insisting that as the property it 
possessed was held in common for the benefit of all the 
members, it should be made liable for the debts of each. 
This having been resisted by the society, the Parliament, in 
order to reach a correct decision, compelled the surrender of 
the constitution. It was then decided that the defense set 
up could not be maintained, whereupon judgment was ren- 



9 Nicolini, p. 128. 



THE PORTUGUESE AND THE JESUITS. 195 

dered against the society, and the debt was paid. After 
this time — when the principles of the constitution became 
known — the odium in which the Jesuits were held rapidly 
increased among both Roman Catholics and Protestants, but 
more particularly among the former, on account of their 
unremitting efforts to defeat and embarrass the investigation 
ordered by the pope. Unsophisticated minds, accustomed 
to respect the Church and obey its authority, could not 
understand why so many impediments should be thrown in 
the way of the pope in his efforts to discover the truth, if 
the society were, as it pretended to be, entirely faultless in 
its conduct. Even the authority of the Church was com- 
paratively powerless to resist and overcome their obstinacy, 
as we shall have many occasions to observe in the course of 
our inquiries. 



CHAPTER XII. 

IDOLATROUS USAGES INTRODUCED. 

It must not be supposed that the only grounds of com- 
plaint against the Jesuits were those already enumerated. 
Wheresoever they were sent among heathen and unchristian- 
ized peoples, they gave trouble to the Church, and inflicted 
serious injury upon the cause of Christianity. When they 
found a missionary field occupied by any of the monastic 
orders, they endeavored either to remove them, or to destroy 
their influence by assailing their Christian integrity, so that 
they could have everything their own way. They accus- 
tomed themselves to obtain their ends by whatsoever means 
they found necessary, considering the latter as justified by 
the former. Not in Paraguay alone, but wheresoever else 
they obtained dominion over ignorant and credulous popula- 
tions, it was mainly accomplished by persuading them to 
believe that conversion to Christianity consisted in the mere 
recital of formal words the professed converts didnot under- 
stand, and in the ceremony of baptism without any intelli- 
gent conception of its character, or of the example and 
teachings of Christ. The seeds of error they thus succeeded 
in scattering broadcast among the natives of India, China, 
and elsewhere, have grown into such poisonous fruits that 
all the intervening years have failed to provide an antidote, 
and it remains a lamentable fact that the descendants of 
these same professing converts have relapsed into idolatry, 
and continued to shun Christianity as if all its influences 
were pestilential. They became Brahmins in India, and, by 
practicing the idolatrous rites and ceremonies of that coun- 
try, brought the cause of Christianity into degradation. 
Continuing steadily to follow the advice of Loyola, they 
196 



IDOLATROUS USAGES INTRODUCED. 197 

everywhere became "all things to all men," by worshiping 
at the shrines of the lowest forms of heathen superstition 
as if they were the holy altars of the Church. And when 
rebuked for this by the highest authorities of the Church, 
they justified themselves upon the ground that any form of 
vice, deception, and immorality became legitimated by Chris- 
tianity when practiced in its name. In China they engaged 
with the natives in worshiping Confucius instead of Christ, 
and made offerings upon his altar without the slightest 
twinge of conscience. They omitted nothing, howsoever de- 
grading, which they found necessary to successfully planting 
the Jesuit scepter among the Oriental populations, until at 
last, after a long and hard struggle, they were brought into 
partial obedience by the Church, whose authority they had 
defied, and whose precepts they contemptuously violated. 

Whatsoever may be said or thought of the various re- 
ligions which have prevailed throughout the world, there is 
one thing about which there can be no misunderstanding; 
that is, that the Brahminism of India and the Christianity 
of Christ can not be united together harmoniously. There 
are many reasons for this, apparent to every intelligent mind, 
but a few only are sufficient for present purposes. It has 
always been the central idea of the former that Brahma 
should be worshiped through a multitude of divinities, rep- 
resenting each passion and emotion of the mind; and that 
his wrath shall be appeased by sacrificial offerings, ^ven of 
human beings, in order to reach total annihilation as the 
highest and most perfect state of beatitude after death ; 
whereas the central idea of Christianity is that worship is 
due only to one God, the Author of all being and the Sov- 
ereign of the universe, so that when man shall reach "the 
last of earth," his spirit shall enter upon immortality. Brah- 
minism held India for centuries in degrading bondage, and 
Christianity was designed to lift mankind to a higher plane 
of being. This belief was universal among all Christians, 
howsoever they may have differed in forms of faith and 
modes of worship; and none were louder in its profession 



198 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

than the Jesuits, who pretended that they alone were worthy 
to occupy the missionary field, and were specially and divinely 
set apart to spread the gospel among all heathen peoples. 
In carrying on their work, however, in India, they violated 
their solemn vow of fidelity to the Church by casting aside 
every pretense of Christianity, and openly, but with simu- 
lated professions of Christian zeal, adopting the idolatrous 
practices common to the natives. They shamelessly cast 
aside the profession of Christianity as if it were a thing of 
reproach, and performed with alacrity the most revolting 
Hindoo rites, seemingly as regardless of the obligation of 
obedience to the Church as of their own dignity and manli- 
ness of character. They substituted fraud, deceit, and hy- 
pocrisy for that open, frank, and courageous course of conduct 
which a sense of right never fails to suggest to ingenuous 
minds. They unchristianized themselves by becoming Brah- 
mins and pariahs, crawling stealthily and insidiously into the 
highest places, and sinking with equal ease and skill into 
the lowest and most degrading. Even in this enlightened 
and investigating age, many intelligent people will wonder 
whether or no these things are possibly true, inasmuch as 
they shock so seriously every sense of personal honor and 
religious duty. But the verifications of them are sufficiently 
abundant to remove all possible doubt, furnished, as they 
are, not alone by the authors of general history, but by 
those friendly -to the Jesuits, and usually prompt to apologize 
for them. 

One of the most conspicuous of the Jesuit missionaries 
to India, after Xavier, was Nobili, who reached Madura 
about the beginning of the seventeenth century. It is pre- 
tended that his predecessors had been unable to convert any 
of the Brahmins, inasmuch as they had labored exclusively 
with the pariahs, who, besides being shunned and despised 
by the Brahmins, had paid no heed whatsoever to their 
Christian admonitions. Nobili, therefore, taxed his ingenuity 
to discover some practical method of removing this difficulty. 
He had before him numerous examples of those who had 



IDOLATROUS USAGES INTRODUCED. 199 

spread the cause of Christianity by openly professing and 
courageously vindicating it. There was something inspiring 
in the thought that in its past successes Christianity had re- 
quired no disguises, but had achieved its victories over 
paganism in the field of open and manly controversy. To 
a devout and Christian mind there was no ground of com- 
promise between Brahminism and Christianity. One or the 
other had to yield — they could not unite. Nobili knew 
this, and but for his Jesuit training would scarcely have de- 
parted from the plain line of Christian duty. With his 
mind, however, disciplined by the belief that it was his duty 
to be "all things to all men," he imitated the example of 
Mahomet, who went to the mountain when it would not 
come to him, by casting aside his character of Christian and 
becoming a Brahmin himself. He assumed the character 
and position of a " Saniassi;" that is, the highest caste among 
the Hindoos. What that word means is not very plain, but 
the Jesuits insist that those Brahmins who bore it had given 
some indications of penitence, and that the object of Nobili 
was to insinuate himself into their favor, secretly and by 
false pretenses, and thus bring them over to Christianity. 
There is much reason for believing that this was an after- 
thought, set up as a defense when the flagrant and unchris- 
tian conduct of the Jesuits excited general distrust among 
the Christians of Europe. But if it expressed the real 
motive existing at the time, it was then, as always, wholly 
without justification or excuse — a plain and manifest breach 
of Christian obligation and duty. He could not become a 
Saniassi without denying that he either was or had ever 
been a Christian, and without solemnly affirming that he 
was a native Hindoo, and not a European — the latter, 
known by the hated name of Feringees, being held in special 
and universal contempt by all the natives, and especially by 
the Brahmins. 

Ail these things, of course, involve false professions and 
oaths without number ; and, more than that, such stifling of 
the conscience as to leave it incapable of distinguishing be- 



200 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

tween truth and falsehood, or between fair and false dealiDg. 
It was all done, says the Jesuit historian Dauriguac, " with 
the approval of his superiors and of the Archbishop of 
Cranganore ;" that is, it had full Jesuit indorsement. And 
as if it were possible to fiud merit in such profanation of 
what all Christians consider sacred, by departing from the 
rules of Christian life, this same authority informs his read- 
ers how Nobili appeared as a Jesuit-Brahmin, after he dis- 
carded all the distinguishing marks and characteristics of 
Christianity, and presented himself in the capacity of a full- 
fledged native Hiudoo. "He assumed," says he, " the cos- 
tume of the penitent Brahmins, adopted their exterior rule 
of life, and spoke their mysterious language." He shaved 
his head, wore the Brahmin dress, including ear-rings reach- 
ing down his neck. And "to complete the illusion" — that 
is, the deception and false pretense — he represents him as hav- 
ing " marked his forehead with a yellow paste, made from 
the wood of Sandanam" — a practice peculiar to the Hindoo 
Brahmins. Thus metamorphosed he " passed for a perfect 
Saniassi, and the Brahmins themselves, wondering at such a 
rival, sought his presence, and questioned him as to himself, 
his country, and his family." His disguise, however, per- 
fect as it was, did not cause him to forget that he was still 
in fact a Jesuit, and he, obedient to his training, carried his 
impostures and falsehoods far enough to make his deception 
complete aud effectual. Consequently, "his oath obtained 
for him admission among the most learned and holy Brah- 
mins of the East. They named him Tatouva-Podagar- 
Sonami — a master in the ninety-six qualities of the truly 
wise." And thus, by means of the most unblushing hypoc- 
risy and false oaths, Nobili denied his religion, his name, 
his country, and the God whom he had professed to wor- 
ship, and became a Hindoo Saniassi, all for " the greater 
glory of God" 1 

Numerous other Jesuits imitated this example of Nobili, 



Daurignac, Vol. I, p. 303. 



IDOLATROUS USAGES INTRODUCED. 201 

and became both Brahmins and pariahs. Some of them 
were specially trained and tutored for the purpose, under 
the elastic system of Jesuit education, each one, of course, 
having been carefully instructed in the best and safest modes 
of practicing deception, of violating oaths, and of making 
the basest means contribute to the end designed to be accom- 
plished. It is claimed for them, apologetically, that they 
thus became enabled to convert many hundred thousand 
Indians, both Brahmins and pariahs, to the cause of Chris- 
tianity. No intelligent mind, however, can be misled by 
such a pretense as this, for if even that number of the natives 
were brought under their influence, they could not have 
risen higher than the low standard fixed by the lives of their 
Jesuit instructors. But this story can not be accepted as 
true, coming as it does only from the active agents in this 
vast system of fraud and falsehood. It is far more likely to 
have been only one more untruth added to the multitude 
which these Jesuit impostors were in the habit of repeating 
daily. Besides, if any such conversions to Christianity had 
occurred, the impostures of the Jesuits would have been dis- 
covered, and the whole of them driven from the country. 
The Jesuits then in India admit enough themselves to assure 
us of this. One of them said: "Our whole attention is 
given to concealing from the people that we are what they 
call Feringees. The slightest suspicion of this on their part 
would oppose an insurmountable obstacle to the propagation 
of the faith," — the plain and obvious import of which is, that 
honesty and fair dealing would have weakened the cause of 
Christianity, whereas its strength was increased and maintained 
by false pretenses, false swearing, and the false profession of de- 
votion to the Brahminical religion. Another one of them said : 
"The missionaries are not known to be Europeans. If they 
were believed to be so, they would be forced to abandon the 
country; for they could gain absolutely no fruit whatever. 
The conversion of the Hindoos is nearly impossible to evan- 
gelical laborers from Europe: I mean impossible to those 
who pass for Europeans, even though they wrought miracles." 



202 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

At another place he represents that it " would have been 
the absolute ruin of Christianity " if the Jesuits had been 
known as Feringees or Europeans; that is, that in order to 
advance Christianity, it was necessary to deny it, even under 
oath, and to profess that the idolatry of the Hindoos was the 
true worship of God. 2 

The pretense of the Jesuits, therefore, that immense 
numbers of converts to Christianity were made by them, 
must have been entitled to no higher credit than their other 
professions ; at all events, the acknowledged authors of a 
system of falsehoods and deceptions are not entitled to our 
confidence. It is possible, however, that they may have suc- 
ceeded in baptizing in secret a few of the natives, and that 
some Brahmins were among them. But if they did, it is 
quite certain that the ceremony must have been adminis- 
tered by stealth, and generally so that those who were bap- 
tized had no distinct knowledge of what it meant, and may 
not even have known the time of its administration. At no 
point in the Jesuit missionary system has more harm been 
done to the cause of true Christianity than at this. Millions 
of ignorant and deluded people have been persuaded to be- 
lieve that Christianity consisted in nothing else but the mere 
ceremony of baptism, without any intelligent conception of 
God. Xavier commenced this system in India, and these 
Jesuit-Brahmins, who followed Nobili, were his imitators. 
Taking all the accounts together, the number of converts in 
India was simply enormous, and yet in 1776, after the 
Jesuits had left there, a very small percentage of their esti- 
mated numbers were found. 3 But these exaggerations are 
more excusable than the methods adopted to impose baptism 
upon unsuspecting and simple-minded multitudes. The Ger- 
man Steinmetz, alluding to this, says: "They insinuate 
themselves as physicians into the houses of the Indians; draw 
a wet cloth over the head and forehead of the sick person, 



2 Steinmetz, Vol. Ill, p. 474. Citing.the Jesuit Fathers De Bourges 
and Martin. 3 Ibid., p. 489. 



IDOLATROUS USAGES INTRODUCED. 203 

even when at the point of death ; mutter privately to them- 
selves the baptism service ; and think they have made one 
Christian more, who is immediately added to the list." The 
Jesuit De Bourges is represented by him as saying: "When 
the children are in danger of death, our practice is to bap- 
tize them without asking the permission of their parents, 
which would certainly be refused. The Catechists and the 
private Christians are well acquainted with the formula of 
baptism, and they confer it on these dying children, under 
the pretext of giving them medicine ;" that is, by that kind of 
"pious fraud" which, according to the Jesuits, promotes 
"the greater glory of God." Another Jesuit father, whose 
experience in India enabled him to speak advisedly, men- 
tions one woman " whose knowledge of the pulse and of the 
symptoms of approaching death was so unerring, that of 
more than ten thousand children whom she had herself bap- 
tized, not more than two escaped death." The number of 
such baptisms during a famine in 1737 are alleged by still 
another Jesuit to have been " upwards of 12,000." And he 
supplements this statement by saying that "it was rare, in 
any place where there were neophytes, for a single heathen 
child to die unbaptized."* Looking over this whole field of 
Jesuit operations, and contemplating the demoralizing influ- 
ences of the Jesuits in India, this same German historian 
feels himself warranted in saying that "every Jesuit who 
entered within these unholy bounds, bid adieu to principle 
and truth — all became perjured impostors, and the lives of 
all ever afterwards were but one long, persevering, toilsome 

LIE." 5 

It would be a fruitless task to summarize the pretexts in- 
vented by the Jesuits to convince ignorant and superstitious 
people that God not only approved, but directly sanctioned, 
the frauds and perjuries they practiced in his name, and that 
he had specially and divinely set them apart — distinct from 



* Steinmetz, Vol. Ill, p. 490, and note 1, where these authorities 
are cited. 5 Ibid., p. 491. 



204 FOOTPRINTS OF TEE JESUITS. 

any other body of people in the world — to demonstrate how 
"the greater glory of God" could be promoted by such in- 
iquities. If the line could be accurately drawn between 
their good and evil deeds, it would be most instructive to ob- 
serve how enormously the latter exceed the former. There 
was no trouble whatsoever for a Jesuit Saniassi to assume 
the character of a Christian and an idolatrous Hindoo almost 
at the same instant of time, in which dual capacity he could 
perform miracles, like those of Xavier, with the ease and 
skill of a modern prestidigitator. They even held the wild- 
est animals at bay by the odor of sanctity which encircled 
them! One of them states that, when traveling at night with 
his companions, a large tiger was discovered approaching 
them, when, by simply crying out, " Sancta Maria!" the fero- 
cious animal became terrified and moved away, showing, 
" by the grinding of his teeth, how sorry he was to let such 
a fine prey escape." Another, to show how Providence over- 
shadowed and shielded the Jesuits, said " that when heathens 
and Christians happened to be together, the tigers devour the 
former without doing any harm to the faithful — these last 
finding armor of proof in the sign of the cross, and in the 
holy name of Jesus and Mary." 6 Such superstitious tales as 
these are told, and many pretended miracles added to them, 
with a seeming unconsciousness upon the part of those who 
relate them, that the world has reached a period when the 
truth can be discovered, even through all the disguises which 
falsehood and deception may throw around it. 

To those who have not investigated the history of the 
Jesuits, as written by themselves, these accusations may seem 
harsh and unmerited ; not so, however, to those who have. 
No matter where they went, the obligation of being V all 
things to all men " was held to be obligatory upon every 
member of the society. Obedience to the Superior was the 
highest virtue, notwithstanding it may have involved viola- 
tions of the laws of God, of morality, and of society. How 



« Steinmetz, Vol. Ill, p. 467. 



ID OLA TR US USAGES INTE OD UCED. 205 

else could professed Christians pretend to be engaged in the 
practice of virtue by denying Christ, disavowing his worship, 
and habitually practicing the debasing rites of the Hindoo 
religion, for more than a century, as Nobili and his Jesuit 
followers and imitators did? And what other possible pre- 
text can be offered for the Jesuit worship of Confucius in 
China, in religious confraternity with the natives, who made 
their public ceremonies and festivities special testimonials of 
their adoration of him as the founder of their national re- 
ligion and the chief among the gods of their idolatry ? We 
shall see how these things were by the proceedings which led 
to their condemnation by the popes, although the Jesuit his- 
torians, who are forced to acknowledge them, try hard to 
show that the pontificial censure was not deserved. 

Daurignac — the ablest of the Jesuit defenders — referring 
to the course of Nobili and others who practiced idolatrous 
rites, says: "Some Europeans had been scandalized by this 
method of appearing all things to all men, in order to win all 
to Christ" This sentence is misleading in this, that instead 
of there being merely "some "who felt scandalized, there 
were multitudes throughout Europe. The ecclesiastical au- 
thorities at Goa, in India, were also of this number; and 
when the complaint reached there that Nobili " had become 
a Brahmin, and given himself up to idolatry and supersti- 
tion," he was summoned to Goa to explain his conduct. He 
could not disobey this summons, and when he reached there, 
" the sight of his singular costume elicited a general expres- 
sion of indignation " among the Christians. When required 
to explain, by the Archbishop of Goa, as the official repre- 
sentative of the Church — appointed by the pope for that pur- 
pose — the only defense he could make was that his motives were 
good ; that is, that the prostitution of himself and his sacred 
calling was well meant because his object was to promote " the 
greater glory of God !" The Jesuits at Goa accepted his rea- 
sons "as sufficient," says Daurignac. There are two methods 
of accounting for this : First, they were Jesuits; and second, 
because Nobili's method of falsehood and deception opened to 



206 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

them new and extensive fields of operation, which, if recog- 
nized, they could occupy with great success in extending the 
power of their society. But the archbishop thought otherwise, 
and "absolutely refused " to accept Nobili's reasons as satisfac- 
tory. Accordingly — speaking for the Church and the pope, 
as he was authorized and empowered to do — he condemned 
the conduct of Nobili and the reasons he assigned. Nobili 
" asserted that the truths of the gospel could not have 
been introduced into Madura by any other means;" but the 
archbishop refused to accept this excuse, evidently regarding 
it as a debasing doctrine, aimed at the very foundation of 
Christianity. Neither would yield. Nobili, backed by the 
Jesuits, insisted that he was under no obligation to obey the 
archbishop, although he acted under the special authority of 
the Church and the pope; and the result was that the mat- 
ter had to be sent to Rome and the decision of the pope 
awaited. In the meantime Nobili returned to Madura, 
where he continued his idolatrous practices, notwithstanding 
the censure of the Archbishop of Goa was resting upon him, 
and he was thereby placed in the attitude of disobedience to 
the legitimate authority of the Church. 7 

Jesuit ingenuity was not sufficient to limit the scope of 
the inquiry thus brought before the pope and the Papal Curia 
at Rome, because of the increasing indignation against the 
society. Added to the complaints of the Portuguese author- 
ities regarding their conduct in Paraguay, and that of Nobili 
at Madura, their idolatrous worship of Confucius in China 
came generally to be known about this time. Consequently, 
the investigation which it became necessary for the pope to 
make, had not only increased in importance, but became 
broader almost every day. Not only were the matters in- 
volved important to the Church, but to the cause of Chris- 
tianity throughout the world ; for it was easy to foresee the 
injurious and demoralizing results if the Jesuits were per- 
mitted to mingle Christian and idolatrous worship together, 



* Daurignac, Vol. I, pp. 336-367. 



IDOLATROUS USAGES INTRODUCED. 207 

so as to make it appear to every heathen people within the 
limits of their missions that Christianity sanctions both forms 
of worship in the same degree. Consequently, it became 
necessary for the pope to examine and decide both questions 
at the same time ; that is, whether the Church could right- 
fully tolerate either the adoption and practice of the Hindoo 
rites by the Jesuits in India, or their participation in the idol- 
atrous worship of Confucius in China. 

Among the notable events connected with the latter was 
the arrival in China of some Dominican and Franciscan 
missionaries, and their surprise at discovering the idola- 
trous practices of the Jesuits. Having never suspected even 
the possibility of the teachings of the Church being so tor- 
tured as to furnish apology for idolatry, they considered the 
conduct of the Jesuits ''a real scandal," which deserved 
to be rebuked. What seemed to them as especially cen- 
surable was the fact that the Jesuits had taught their 
neophytes to use the Chinese term "King- Tien" to express 
the idea of God — not as the Creator of the universe, but as 
the presiding Deity over a multitude of other deities, each 
having a separate sphere of sovereignty. To them it was 
not easy to conceive of anything more likely to undermine 
Christianity, because by limiting or lessening in any way the 
sovereign attributes of God, the whole Christian system 
would topple and fall. They, accordingly, notified the 
apostolic vicar in China, as the immediate representative of 
the Church there, of this unscrupulous and unchristian con- 
duct of the Jesuits, in order, if possible, to apply the proper 
corrective and remove the ''scandal" from the Church. 
The vicar did not have much to do to discover that the 
accusations of the monks against the Jesuits were true ; and 
when this became known to him, he not only condemned 
their idolatry, but "severely censured them" for practicing 
it. The Jesuits, by way of defense, attempted to explain 
why they had applied an idolatrous Chinese term to the God 
of the Christians, and in doing so exhibited their accustomed 
sophistry — in which they have always been adepts — in such 



208 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

way as to convince the vicar, as well as the Dominican and 
Franciscan monks, of their entire want of sincerity and 
candor, to say nothing of their loss of Christian integrity. 
They pfe tended that " the honors paid to Confucius were 
merely civil ceremonies, with which the Christians did not 
associate any religious ideas whatever, and that the word 
King-Tien, in the Chinese language, simply conveyed the idea 
of God as understood by Christians." This, they said, they 
were informed by the Chinese mandarins and learned men. 
Hence, they argued that unless the idolatrous worship they 
had adopted were allowed to prevail, it would be impossible 
to obtain sufficient influence over the Chinese to draw them 
to Christianity — the precise meaning of which was, that 
unless they were permitted to practice the idolatrous rites of 
heathenism, the Chinese could never be induced to become 
Christians. This argument was thoroughly Jesuitical, and 
failed to mislead either the vicar apostolic or the Domin- 
ican and Franciscan monks, all of whom could see through 
the thin disguise with which the Jesuits attempted to con- 
ceal their ultimate purpose of bringing the Church author- 
ities, with the pope at their head, in obedience to them. It 
did not require any Chinese learning for them to understand 
that it was impossible, in the nature of things, for the 
Chinese to have introduced into their languageany word, or 
even any set of words, expressive of the idea of God as Chris- 
tians understood it. They were familiar with the universal 
rule that the language of every people is constructed solely 
to express their own ideas, sentiments, and thoughts, and 
not such as prevail among those with whom they hold no 
intercourse. Candor and fair dealing with the Church and 
the cause of Christianity, therefore, required them to recog- 
nize the facts that the Chinese word King-Tien conveyed only 
the idolatrous idea of the superior godship of Confucius, and 
that it was so used in all the civic and other ceremonies of 
the Chinese. The result consequently was, that the vicar 
united with the monks in repudiating the position and doc- 
trine of the Jesuits, and vigorously condemned and censured 



IDOLATROUS USAGES INTRODUCED. 209 

them for bringing the established worship of the Church into 
disrepute. This decision alone — made by the regularly con- 
stituted authorities of the Church — constitutes a most im- 
portant and pregnant fact, which should not be overlooked 
by those who desire to understand the history of the most 
wonderful society the world has ever known. 

This decision undoubtedly conformed to the opinion of 
the pope and of all the Church authorities throughout 
Europe, outside the circle of Jesuits. When announced by 
the apostolic vicar, with the approval of the monks, it should 
have put a stop to all further idolatrous proceedings on the 
part of the Jesuits. Any other body of men, who acknowl- 
edged the jurisdiction of the Church, would either have 
obeyed it by entirely abandoning the condemned practices at 
once, or, at all events, would have ceased to follow them 
until the prohibition was removed by the pope, whose supe- 
rior jurisdiction could not be denied without rebellion against 
the Church. But the Jesuits did not belong to an order 
accustomed to submission to any other authority than that 
of their superior, whom each of them had solemnly sworn to 
recognize as equal to God, and to obey accordingly. They 
acquiesced in the decisions of the popes when they conformed 
with their own opinions and purposes; when they did not, 
they employed all their combined ingenuity and cunning to 
evade them. Consequently, they disobeyed the vicar, 
spurned the counsel of the monks, and persisted in continu- 
ing their idolatrous practices, under the pretense that they 
were awaiting the decision of the pope. 8 

The popes were compelled to deal slowly and cautiously 
with such questions on account of the difficulty of access to 
such remote countries as India and China, and the unavoid- 
able delays in transmitting intelligence between them and 
Rome. Precautionary measures were adopted by sending 
special prelates of the Church, chosen by the pope for that 
purpose, not only with directions to investigate and report 



8 Daurignac, p. 53. 

14 



210 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the facts, but with authority to establish temporary regula- 
tions which should become operative while waiting the pope's 
approval, and final when that was given. One of these 
prelates was a Spanish Dominican, named Morales, who was 
sent to China in 1633 by Pope Urban VIII. This was 
twelve years after the matter had been submitted to Paul V, 
and was rendered necessary by the fact that it had remained 
undecided during the pontificate of Gregory XV. When 
Morales reached China, he entered upon the necessary ex- 
amination with sufficient care to become convinced of the 
unchristian conduct of the Jesuits, and, accordingly, con- 
demned their ceremonies as idolatrous. This incensed the 
Chinese authorities — who are supposed to have been influ- 
enced to this by the Jesuits — and "the Dominicans and the 
Franciscans were driven from the country," leaving the 
Jesuits alone to follow their idolatrous practices without 
the interference of the monks or of Morales, who, being a 
Dominican, was included among those expelled. Morales 
had then spent twelve years in China, and all that time was 
laboring with the Jesuits to induce them to give up their 
participation in the worship of Confucius; but his efforts were 
wholly unavailing. They had brought themselves into favor 
at the court of the Chinese emperor, and were unwilling to 
surrender the advantages thus obtained, preferring them to 
the service of the Church. There was, therefore, no other 
course left to Morales, after his expulsion from China, but 
to proceed to Rome and report to the pope, who was then 
Innocent X. This he did in 1645, when he fully laid before 
the pope what he had observed in China, making known, of 
course, the fact that he had been banished on account of his 
fidelity to the trust assigned him. It was impossible for the 
pope to abandon the matter at this point, and he accordingly 
submitted to the Congregation of the Propaganda, to be de- 
cided for his information and guidance, these two questions : 
"Is it permissible to prostrate one's self before the idol 
Chachinchiam t Is it permissible to sacrifice to Keumfucum; 
that is, Confucius?" By these questions the Jesuit methods 



ID OLA TRO US USA GES INTR OD UCED. 2 1 1 

of procedure in China were brought ''directly before this 
established tribunal of the Church at Rome, so that the de- 
cision of them by the pope was unavoidable. What that 
decision was, is shown by the following statement made under 
the immediate auspices of Archbishop Hughes, of New York, 
in the "Lives and Times of Roman Pontiffs," by De Montor: 
" On the reply of the Congregation, the pope issued a decree 
forbidding missionaries of any order or institute to do either 
of those things, until the Holy See gave a contrary order." 9 
Thus, whatsoever other popes may have done or omitted to 
do, Innocent X solemnly decreed that the Jesuit practices 
were wrong and would be no longer tolerated by the Church. 
He had not then learned — what became perfectly apparent to 
many of his successors — that the Jesuits w r ere as familiar 
with the various methods of brushing papal decrees out of 
their way as they were with the frauds and hypocrisies by 
which they duped and misled the heathen at the expense of 
the Christian cause. 

There seems to have been some unnecessary delay, and 
possibly some undue prevarication, in the manner in which 
the popes disposed of these troublesome matters. De Montor 
represents that several of the popes who succeeded Innocent 
X permitted the Jesuits to continue their idolatrous cere- 
monies ; to wit, Alexander VII, Clement IX, Clement X, 
Innocent XI, Alexander VIII, and Innocent XII. This 
general statement, however, is misleading, and calculated to 
do injustice to these popes, unless taken in connection with 
the fact that none of them went further than to say that the 
Jesuits might unite with .the Chinese in their civil ceremonies, 
when they were, in no sense, religious. None of them 
undertook to decide whether the sacrifice to Confucius did or 
did not involve religious worship ; for that was the question 
directly submitted to them, and with regard to which the 
utmost pains were taken to procure accurate and reliable 



9 Lives and Times of the Eoman Pontiffs. By De Montor. 
American edition. Vol II, p. 191. 



212 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

evidence. But it is undoubtedly true that the Jesuits mis- 
construed what had been done by these six popes, and per- 
verted their meaning to suit themselves, by continuing their 
idolatrous practices with increased impunity. And they did 
this to such an extent, and so openly, that in 1693, Maigrot, 
Apostolic Vicar, Doctor of the Sorbonne, and Bishop of 
Conon, was constrained, as the representative of the Church, 
to forbid the idolatrous ceremonies of the Jesuits by a special 
prohibitory decree. The date of this decree is important, 
inasmuch as it shows how many years it took and how hard 
it was to bring the Jesuits into subordination to the Church ; 
in other words, how little they cared for the Church, or the 
popes, or vicars apostolic, or the ancient monkish orders, 
when either of them alone, or all combined, ventured to 
place the least impediment in their path. The question with 
regard to the idolatrous practices of Nobili arose first in 
1618, and was submitted to Paul V in 1621. Hence, up to 
the time of his official decree of condemnation by Maigrot, 
as vicar apostolic, seventy-two years — nearly three-quarters 
of a century — had elapsed, during all which time the Jesuits 
had enjoyed an uninterrupted triumph over the Church, the 
popes, and Christianity. 

This condition of things made it absolutely necessary that 
the severe and protracted strain upon the authority of the 
Church should, in some way, be brought to an end, and that 
the stigma the Jesuits had inflicted upon Christianity should 
be removed. Consequently, Pope Clement XI — after eight 
more years of delay — appointed a new vicar apostolic and 
legate in the person of the distinguished Cardinal De Tour- 
non, in order to insure a complete and thorough investiga- 
tion of the conduct of the Jesuits in India and China. He 
was empowered to represent fully the authority of the Church 
and to act in the place of the pope. De Tournon entered 
upon his mission with zeal, and having, after investigation, 
found all the accusations against the Jesuits completely veri- 
fied, issued a decree, in June, 1704, whereby he condemned 
in the strongest and most explicit terms the Chinese and 



IDOLA TROUS USAGES INTROD UCED. 213 

Malabar rites practiced by the Jesuits. This decree is given 
by Nicolini, and a perusal of it will show the degraded state 
into which the Jesuits had brought the professedly Christian 
worship — even to the adoption of the superstitious and im- 
moral customs of the idolaters. 10 Up till this time the Jesuits 
had enjoyed nearly a hundred years of impunity, and as the 
Church had been unable, during this long period, to impose 
upon them any restraint they had not contrived the means 
to defy, their idolatrous worship and demoralizing doctrines 
could no longer be tolerated without incalculable harm. 
Therefore, the severe measures adopted by De Tournon, by 
the express authority of Clement XI, were fully justified. 

The Jesuits again evidenced their perverse and stubborn 
nature by impudently appealing from the decree the pope 
had authorized De Tournon to make in his name, to the pope 
himself, manifestly hoping either to bring him over to their 
side, or to procrastinate his final decision indefinitely. They 
repeated their favorite argument, that Christianity could not 
be propagated in India and China without making the wor- 
ship of idols part of its religious ceremonies. They also im- 
peached the character of the evidence upon which De Tournon 
had relied, by insisting that it was obtained from those who 
did not understand the people of India or China, or their 
languages. In all this they persisted in assuming that, in 
order to convert a heathen people, Christianity must be first 
converted into heathenism, that it may furnish a starting- 
point for obtaining ultimate dominion over them. This 
meant that heathens must be converted to Christianity by 
the Jesuits alone, inasmuch as none others besides them had 
endeavored to engraft upon Christian faith and worship any 
idolatrous ceremonies, or the duty and necessity of falsehood 
and hypocrisy, as means to an end. But the pope was not 
misled by this demoralizing subterfuge, and, after hearing 
them fully and giving all proper consideration to what they 
said, he brushed it all aside by giving his express and unre- 



10 Nicolini, p. 114. 



214 FOOTPRINTS OF TEE JESUITS. 

served approval to the decree published by De Tournon as 
his legate. De Montor admits this; but there is abundant 
evidence of it apart from this admission. In his life of Clem- 
ent XI he says: 

"But Clement, having examined the affair in 1710 and 
1712, confirmed all the decrees that had been made against 
the ceremonies, as well as the edicts of Cardinal De Tournon ; 
and on the 19th of March, 1715, by the constitution Ex ilia 
die (found in Vol. X of the Bullarium Romanian), he more 
vigorously condemned those rites; and he established the form 
of the oath which thenceforth was to be taken by every 
missionary in the Indies, promising that observance in their 
own names, and in the names of their order." ll 

No language could be plainer or more emphatic than 
tbat here employed by the pope. It was not uttered in a 
mere brief, which the Jesuits insist may be changed to an- 
swer any subsequent emergency, but in a formal pontifical 
bull, issued ex cathedra, and which, if the popes were all in- 
fallible, must be accepted as of divine authority. But 
whether called by one or the other of these names, it was 
the solemn official act of a pope — the head of the Church — 
and as such, according to the teachings of the Church, was 
final and binding upon all who professed fidelity to it. And 
it would have been so regarded by any of the ancient mo- 
nastic orders, and by all who had respect for the authority of 
the Church. But the Jesuits did not represent either of 
these classes; and as the power of the pope was not suffi- 
cient to change their course, or unsettle them in their pur- 
poses, they continued to persevere in their disobedience, 
with an utter disregard of consequences. They went to 
the extent of persuading the Emperor of China to order 
the arrest of De Tournon, which was done by the Bishop of 
Macao — who was one of their tools — who caused him to be 
loaded with chains, and thrown into prison, where, from " ill 
treatment," he died. 12 



» De Montor, Vol. II, p. 192. 12 Nicolini, pp. 126-127. 



IDOLATROUS USAGES INTRODUCED. 215 

These incidents, so unfavorable to the peace of the 
Church, threw the questious into abeyance again during the 
succeeding pontificate of Innocent XIII, after which it as- 
sumed such magnitude and importance that Benedict XIII 
was compelled to deal with it both energetically and sternly. 
This he did by further confirming the decree of Cardinal De 
Tournon, and the bull of Clement XI, reasserting the un- 
christian practices and conduct of the Jesuits. But even 
this did not overcome their obduracy ; and the next pope, 
Clement XII, was compelled to issue still another bull, con- 
firming those of Benedict XIII and Clement XI. 13 The 
world has never furnished another instance of such flagrant 
and persistent disobedience as this. Even another pope, 
Benedict XIV, found it absolutely necessary to issue two ad- 
ditional bulls of censure and condemnation against the Jesuits, 
in both of which the decree of De Tournon was approved by 
words of express reaffirmance. He intended and expected 
to settle the matter finally, and terminate the long-continued 
disregard of the Church authority by the Jesuits. Never- 
theless, like his predecessors for many years, he was com- 
pelled to realize that he was dealing with an adversary 
whose ambition was insatiable, and whose capacity for in- 
trigue was without limitation and as untiring as the wind. 
De Montor tells the result, but omits any comment upon the 
triumph of the Jesuits over all the popes who passed censure 
upon them and sought to impose restraints upon their con- 
duct. He speaks of the "discord between the other mission- 
aries and the Jesuits, the former reproaching the latter with 
not fully and frankly observing the bull," and makes the dis- 
comfiture of the popes palpable by adding, "These disputes 
lasted till the dissolution of the society." 14 This is equiva- 
lent to saying that the only way to bring them into obedi- 
ence to the Church was to dissolve them. We shall here- 
after see, however, that they did not even obey the act of 
dissolution. 



1 3 De Montor, Vol. II, p. 192. u Ibid., p. 278. 



2161 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

As the society was originally established by Paul III in 
1540, and was abolished by Clement XIV in 1773, it thus 
appears that considerably more thau one-half the period of 
its existence had been spent in open and flagrant resistance 
to the authority of the popes and the Church — a pregnant 
fact, which no sophistry can palliate or explain. But as our 
inquiries proceed, there will be other years of resistance to 
add to these, along with such combinations of circumstances 
as show how the society became odious to the Christian 
world, and how rightfully it was dissolved. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

PAPAL SUPPRESSION OF THE SOCIETY. 

When Clement XIII became pope, in 1758, events 
which had grown out of the conduct of the Jesuits were 
hurrying forward so rapidly that eveu he, with all the exist- 
ing pontifical power in his hands, was unable to arrest them, 
although, as the patron of the society, he endeavored to do 
so. There was no longer any ground for compromise. 
Their persistent disobedience of royal authority and inter- 
ference with political affairs had made it necessary for the 
Governments to decide w 7 hether they should further submit 
to them or vindicate their own authority by whatsoever steps 
were required. In Portugal the culminating point was 
reached by an attempt to assassinate the king. The actual 
perpetrators were arrested, tried, and executed ; but in the 
course of the investigation it was developed, to the satisfac- 
tion of the public authorities, that the deed had been incited 
by the Jesuits, who had impressed ignorant and fanatical 
minds with the idea that no wrong was committed by killing 
a heretical king; that is, one who did not submit to their 
dictation. An effort was made to place three Jesuit fathers 
upon trial, so that, if found guilty, they might also be prop- 
erly punished. But these fathers were bold enough to defy 
the Government by insisting that, as priests, they were not 
amenable to the civil laws of the State, even for felonious 
acts, but could only be tried by an ecclesiastic tribunal under 
the jurisdiction of the pope. The king and Pombal could 
easily see that this defiance of Government authority over 
the temporal affairs of the kingdom could not be submitted 
to without bringing the State into disgrace and endangering 
its existence. Hence, as a measure absolutely essential to 

217 



218 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the life of the nation, the king " issued a decree of banish- 
ment against the Jesuits as traitors, rebels, enemies to, and 
aggressors on, his person, his States, and the public peace 
and the general good of the people." l The Jesuits were 
then seized, transported to the States of the Church under 
the jurisdiction of Clement XIII, and the three accused 
fathers were placed in prison to await his action. The pope 
defended the Jesuits, and threatened the King of Portugal 
with his veugeance if he did not revoke his decree against 
them. But the king could not submit to interference with 
the temporal affairs of his kingdom even by the pope, who, 
by his approval of the Jesuits, had shown himself willing to 
see the Governments humiliated by them. He, accordingly, 
withdrew the Portuguese ambassador from the court of 
Rome, and proceeded against the three Jesuits, who had re- 
mained in prison under suspicion of having planned the at- 
tack upon his life. The chief one of these was turned over 
to the Dominicans — " the natural enemies of the Jesuits" — 
by whom he was burned alive, and the other two were con- 
demned to imprisonment for life. 2 

The people of Europe became greatly agitated at finding 
in their midst so formidable an enemy to the public peace 
and quiet as the Jesuits. This agitation was increased by 
the trial of the society for the debt of Lavalette before the 
Parliament of Paris, which resulted, as already stated, in 
bringing to the light the odious principles of the Jesuit con- 
stitution, the exposure of which is represented as having pro- 
duced " alarm and consternation among all classes of so- 
ciety." In Frauce the Jesuits made an effort to arrest the 
public indignation by procuring a decree from " fifty bishops," 
who, under the auspices of the nuncio of Clement XIII, 
certified that the principles of the constitution were harm- 
less. But this adroit movement failed to produce the de- 
sired effect. The Parliament, under the lead of Choiseul, 



1 History of the Popes of Rome. By Cormenin. Vol. II, p. 392. 
*Ibid. 



PAPAL SUPPRESSION OF THE SOCIETY. 219 

the prime minister of Louis XV, refused to permit an edict 
to that effect to be registered. Whereupon, the investiga- 
tion into the constitution and statutes of the society was 
continued for some months, and resulted in the enactment 
of a Parliamentary decree which shows the odium then at- 
tached to the society in France. It denounced their doc- 
trines and practices il as perverse, destructive of every principle 
of religion, and even of probity ; as injurious to Christian moral- 
ity, pernicious to civil society, seditious, dangerous to tlie rights 
of tlie nation, the nature of the royal power, and the safety of 
the persons of sovereigns ; as fit to excite the greatest troubles in 
States, to form and maintain the most profound corruption in the 
hearts of men." It would be impossible to find language 
more expressive ; and when it is considered that it was ut- 
tered by a Parliamentary body composed only of those who 
maintained the faith of the Church of Rome, it may readily 
be supposed that the most imminent necessity called it forth. 
And it will excite no surprise that the same decree pro- 
ceeded to provide " that the institutions of the Jesuits should 
forever cease to exist throughout the whole extent of the 
kingdom," and that it also prohibited them from teaching in 
the schools, from longer recognizing the authority of their 
general, and from wearing a religious dress. 3 

Clement XIII, feeliug himself powerful enough to resist 
this decree, endeavored, as the friend of the Jesuits, to break 
its force by issuing a counter decree of his own. At this 
point it is worthy of remark that the Parliamentary decree 
had reference to temporal affairs, and did not, in any way, 
interfere with the religious faith of the Church, which the 
French Christians continued to maintain according to their 
traditions and teachings. The decree of Clement XIII, 
therefore, was the assertion upon his part of the pontifical 
right to dictate the temporal policy of France. He explicitly 
asserted this by affixing his papal "curse" upon all who 
obeyed the decree of the Parliament, and by declaring it to 



8 History of the Popes of Rome. By Cormenin. Vol. II, p. 393. 



220 FOOTPRINTS OF TUB JESUITS. 

be " null, inefficacious, invalid, aud entirely destitute of all 
lawful effect," and by releasing all who had sworn to ob- 
serve it from the obligation of their oaths.* In the face of 
this pontifical mandate, however, the decree of Parliament 
was executed, and four thousand Jesuits were driven out of 
Paris. Clement XIII was incensed at this, and issued a for- 
mal bull in praise of the Jesuits and in denunciation of their 
opposers. The Parliament suppressed this bull, and refused 
to permit it to be printed in France. The Parliament of 
Aix went even further, by having it " torn up by the exe- 
cutioner and publicly burned," and by inviting Louis XV 
" to avenge himself on the court of Rome and the pope." 5 
The King of France, however, was weak enough to suffer 
himself to be prevailed upon to allow a Synod of the clergy 
to be convened, under pretense of putting an end to " the 
disputes between the civil and religious powers," as if such 
a thing were then possible without submission to Jesuit dic- 
tation, backed as the society was by an irritable and imprac- 
ticable pope, who had vainly supposed himself powerful 
enough to check the tide of indignation then beating upon 
the Jesuits. Impressed by the opinions and policy of Clem- 
ent XIII, this Synod adopted a course favorable to the Jesuits 
by endeavoring to change the issue, so as to conceal the real 
question. With the view of making it appear that the 
Church itself, and even Christianity, was in danger, they 
fulminated anathemas against the works of the French phi- 
losophers — of Bayle, of Helve tius, of Rousseau, of Voltaire, 
and of the Encyclopaedists — thereby furnishing arguments 
which have ever since done Jesuit service by misleading the 
unwary into the belief that Christianity and Jesuitism are of 
synonymous meaning, and that the destruction of the latter 
would be the death of the former. They, moreover, tried to 
favor the Jesuits by declaring "that the Church alone had 
the right to teach and instruct children ; that it alone could 



* History of the Popes of Rome. By Cormenin. Vol. II, p. 393. 
*26id.,p. 394. 



PAPAL SUPPRESSION OF THE SOCIETY. 221 

judge in matters of doctrine, and fix the degree of sub- 
mission which was due to them," and that " the civil author- 
ity could in no way go against the Canon law." 6 This as- 
sumption of ecclesiastical authority was intended to strengthen 
the papacy, and was accepted by the Jesuits as favorable to 
them, because the pope at that time was their friend. But 
the Parliament of Paris could not fail to see that, if recog- 
nized, it would place the papacy above the State, and France 
at the mercy of the Jesuits, at least during the pontificate of 
Clement XIII. It therefore declared it to be " derogatory 
to the authority of the Government," and prohibited the 
people from obeying it. In consequence of this Parliamen- 
tary opposition, the prelates who had shaped the course of 
the Synod were driven to the necessity of seeking the aid of 
Louis XV, so as to avenge themselves upon the enemies of 
the Jesuits by means of royal power. The king, who was 
then " reeking from his debaucheries " — for which he fouud 
shelter in the acquiescence of the Jesuits — succeeded in ob- 
taining an edict which annulled the decree of Parliament. 
Encouraged by this success, the Jesuits demanded their res- 
toration to authority, supposing that, with the king and the 
pope both upon their side, they would then be able to tri- 
umph over all opposition. But their Parliamentary antago- 
nists were not overcome so easily, and rallied sufficiently to 
obtain another decree against them, not less condemnatory 
than that which had been temporarily suspended. Mean- 
while, hostility to the Jesuits was rapidly increasing through- 
out Europe, which incensed them the more, inasmuch as 
they would not abate their extreme demands, and could com- 
promise nothing without an acknowledgment of their wrong — 
which they were never known to make. Spain then fol- 
lowed the example of Portugal, and the king, Charles III, 
expelled them from his dominions. Thus, at the time re- 
ferred to, they were expelled from the territories of the three 
great Roman Catholic States — Portugal, Spain, and France. 



6 History of the Popes of Rome. By Cormenin. Vol II, p. 394. 



222 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

The King of the Two Sicilies, and Ferdinand, Duke ot 
Parma and Placencia, also expelled them from their domin- 
ions. By common consent among these powers, the Jesuits 
were sent to Italy, where the pope, in return for their de- 
votion to him, was expected to provide for their wants and 
to see that proper protection was afforded them. Clement 
XIII had resisted all these strong powers in order to defend 
them, and this measure was adopted in preference to an 
open breach with the pope, so that he might be made to 
realize the extent of the indignation against them. In the 
strong language of Cormenin — a Roman Catholic, but in- 
tensely hostile to the Jesuits — '■ the soil of Italy was pol- 
luted by this unclean slime which the nations had rejected, 
and which they had sent back to Rome, the fountain of all 
corruption." 7 

Clement XIII became indignant when he found himself 
unable to counteract the general prejudice existiug against 
the Jesuits, and, with strange infatuation, allowed his pas- 
sions to obtain complete mastery over him. He fulminated 
anathemas against the Kings of Portugal, Spain, France, 
the Two Sicilies, and the Duke of Parma and Placencia, and 
threatened them with excommunication if they did not cease 
their opposition to the Jesuits. He even went so far as to 
send papal troops against the Duke of Parma to bring him 
to obedience by military coercion. But the other powers 
were not alarmed by the sound of the pontifical thunder, and 
the Kings of France, Spain, Portugal, and Naples promptly 
pronounced against the pope, and prepared to punish him for 
marching an army against the Duke of Parma, whose policy 
towards the Jesuits w T as the same as their own. Even Louis 
XV was induced by Choiseul, his minister, to unite upon 
this point with the other kings. Thereupon, the King of 
the Two Sicilies invaded the papal province of Beneventum 
with an army, intending thereby to teach the pope that he 
was transcending his legitimate powers as head of the Church. 



' History of the Popes of Rome. By Cormenin. Vol. II, p. 394. 



PAPAL SUPPRESSION OF THE SOCIETY. 223 

The bull of the pope was torn up at the courts of Portugal, 
Spain, and Parma, and by the Parliament of Paris. The 
excitement became general, and Clement XIII was awakened 
from his apparent sense of security by the mutterings of the 
storm gathering upon all sides of him. He was brought to 
realize, possibly for the first time, that even he, with all the 
powers of the Church in his hands, was unable to drive back 
the waves then dashing against the papacy, and threatening 
to ingulf it. In this emergency he sought aid from Maria 
Theresa, the Empress of Austria, with the hope that, with 
the assistance of so strong a power, he could make success- 
ful resistance to those combined against the Jesuits. But 
the empress, having cause to complain of the treachery of 
the Jesuits to her, declined to comply with this request, and 
went a step farther by annulling one of the important papal 
bulls which had been published in her dominions. The 
clouds, already lowering over the head of Clement XIII, 
then thickened more rapidly than ever, and the struggling 
pope, finding himself everywhere deserted by the strong 
powers — all of which had hitherto been united in favor of 
the Church — became so humbled in his pride as to declare 
that "he was ready to make concessions;" that is, to do 
something — anything — to arrest the declining fortunes of 
the papacy. Thus humiliated, "he implored the clemency of 
ilie sovereigns" begging them, as we may suppose, to relax 
their grasp upon him on account of their veneration for the 
Church. But it was too late. The impracticable demands of 
the Jesuits had brought on such an issue between the spiritual 
and the temporal powers as to leave no ground for conces- 
sions on the part of the sovereigns, so long as they were per- 
sisted in. They were bound to maintain their own temporal 
powers within their dominions, or else allow the Jesuits to 
rule over them according to their pleasure. To this they 
could not submit without absolute degradation. Howsoever 
strange it may now appear that the pope did not see this 
sooner, it should be regarded as creditable to him that, when 
he did see it, he bowed his head humbly before the pelting 



224 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

storm, and yielded to a necessity he could not avoid. Due 
credit should not be withheld from the man who does right, 
even at the last extremity, especially when, as in this case, 
after Clement XIII decided to change his course, he went 
to the extent of promising the sovereigns that "he would 
pronounce the abolition of the society in a public consistory," 
and leave the Jesuits to suffer the consequences of their own 
folly. Having made up his mind to this, a day was ap- 
pointed for the performance of the solemn act of signing the 
death-warrant of the Jesuits. But this postponement led to 
a result which had not been dreamed of — one that furnished 
new evidence of the capacity of the Jesuits for intrigue. 
During the night preceding the day appointed for the pub- 
lic ceremony of announcing the abolition of the Jesuits, 
Clement XIII was suddenly seized with convulsions, and 
died, leaving the act unperformed, and the Jesuits victorious. 
Cormeuin, writiug in France, where the Jesuits are better 
known and understood than here, records this event in these 
terse and expressive words: " Tlie Jesuits had poisoned him." 9 
The Jesuits do not, of course, agree to this account of 
the manner and circumstances of the pope's death. They 
admit that it was sudden, and that it occurred at the time 
named; but attribute it to the intense sufferings he en- 
dured in consequence of his sympathy for them on account 
of their persecution, and his inability to extend further as- 
sistance to them. De Montor says he died from a sudden 
fit of coughing, brought on by a pulmonary disease. 9 The 
Jesuits admit, however, that the Spanish and French ambas- 
sadors had presented to him memorials from their respective 
Governments asking for the abolition of the society, and in- 
sist that he shed tears in consequence, and expired a few 
days afterwards. 10 But the manner of his death is of no 
special consequence now, since it is more important for us to 
know that, at the time of it, he left undecided the matters 



8 History of the Popes of Rome. By Cormenin. Vol. II, p. 395. 
»De Montor, Vol. II, p. 329. wDaurignac, Vol. II, p. 167. 



PAPAL SUPPRESSION OF THE SOCIETY. 225 

with reference to the general conduct of the Jesuits which 
his predecessor had directed to be investigated. His defense 
of the Jesuits had manifestly been the result of previous and 
general convictions, and not his deliberate judgment upon 
the actual condition of affairs with which they were con- 
nected either in India, China, Paraguay, or in European 
States beyond the limits of Italy.' The facts had not been 
sufficiently developed for final pontifical action, and there- 
fore he acted upon impressions rather than evidence. We 
shall soon see that when the evidence was afterwards fully 
obtained, the result reached by his successor was not only 
fully justified, but inevitable and unavoidable. 

It required three months to elect a successor to Clement 
XIII. The cardinals were divided into two parties — one 
supporting the Jesuits, and the other the Governments of 
France, Spain, and Portugal, united in opposition to them. 
The former desired to subject all civil Governments to 
Jesuit dominion; the latter insisted that the Church and the 
State should each remain free and independent of the other 
in its own domain. After innumerable intrigues — such as 
are familiar to those who manipulate party conventions — the 
latter party triumphed by the election of Ganganelli, a Fran- 
ciscan, who took the name of Clement XIV, and entered 
upon the pontificate in 1769. He was greatly esteemed for 
his virtues, and possessed a conspicuously noble character 
and a mind well and thoroughly disciplined. That he was a 
man of profound ability is abundantly shown by his letters, 
which have been preserved and published, and which con- 
tain many passages of exceeding eloquence and beauty. 11 
He was far better prepared, therefore, to form intelligent 
and impartial conclusions upon the evidence concerning the 
Jesuits than Clement XIII, because, apart from his qualifi- 
cations, he was not under the dominion of undue prejudices. 

The sovereigns demanded of Clement XIV that the ex- 



11 Letters of Pope Clement XIV : To which are Prefixed Anecdotes 
of His Life. By Lottin Le Jeune. London, 1781. 

15 



226 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

pulsion of the Jesuits from their territories should be ap- 
proved, and the society entirely suppressed and abolished. 
Upon the other hand, the Jesuits insisted, with their accus- 
tomed superciliousDess, that it was necessary to the Church 
and the cause of Christianity that they should be restored to 
public favor by his pontifical indorsement. This issue con- 
fronted him at the beginning. At first he somewhat excited 
the hopes of the Jesuits by the course he took against the 
French philosophers, and the bulls of excommunication he 
issued against Diderot, d'Alembert, Voltaire, Helvetius, 
Rousseau, Marmontel, and Holbach. This stimulated them 
afresh, and by their machinations created a party in France, 
headed by Louis XV, which demanded their return to that 
country. But the pope was not driven from the plain line 
of his duty, which required of him that the investigation 
already entered upon should be completed, and that the 
questions involved should be decided according to right and 
justice. This was due to the sovereigns, to the public, and 
especially to the Church. Cormenin says he was suspicious 
of being dealt with like his predecessor, and that he took the 
necessary precautions to guard against it, by substituting a 
faithful monk for the cook of the Quirinal, so as to guard 
against the possibility of poison. Howsoever this may have 
been, he persevered in his course with the courage of a man 
who fears no evil when in the faithful discharge of duty. 
Resolved, however, not to act with undue haste, but to have 
all the matters brought fully before him, together with the 
evidence bearing upon them, he continued the investigation 
for the period of four years, so that when his final decision 
was made the world should be convinced that it was the re- 
sult of calm deliberation and honest conviction. He says of 
himself that he " omitted no care, no pains, in order to ar- 
rive at a thorough knowledge of the origin, the progress, 
and the actual state of that regular order commonly called 
the Company of Jesus ;" and Ranke, the great historian, 
says he " applied himself with the utmost attention to the 
affairs of the Jesuits ;" and adds that " a commission of car- 



PAPAL SUPPRESSION 01 THE SOCIETY. 227 

dinals was formed, the arguments of both sides were deliber- 
ately considered," before his conclusion was announced. 12 
No greater deliberation and no more serious reflection could 
have been bestowed upon any question. The evidence was 
carefully inspected and everything duly considered. The 
scales were held at equipoise until the preponderance of 
proof caused the beam to turn against the Jesuits, when he 
was constrained by a sense of duty to the Church, to Chris- 
tianity, to the public, and to his own conscience, to announce 
the result which gave peace and quiet to the nations and joy 
to the great body of Christians throughout Europe. This he 
did July 21, 1773, by issuing his celebrated bull, " Dominus 
ae Redemptor" — called by the Jesuits a brief — whereby he 
decreed " that the name of the company shall be, and is, 
forever extinguished and suppressed ;" that " no one of them 
do carry their audacity so far as to impugn, combat, or even 
write or speak about the said suppression, or the reasons and 
motives of it ;" and that the said bull of suppression and 
abolition shall " forever and to all eternity be valid, perma- 
nent, and efficacious." 13 

It is well to observe, before further comment upon this 
important papal decree, that it had the effect to increase the 
apprehensions with regard to the personal safety of the pope. 
The manner in which Clement XIII had met his death on 
account of the mere promise to suppress the Jesuits, was 
well calculated to excite the fear that the same fate might 
befall Clement XIV, in revenge for their actual abolition. 
Hence, all the avenues of approach to the pope were care- 
fully watched, and the utmost precautions employed to 
guard against the possibility of poison. These were success- 
ful for about eight months, when a peasant woman was per- 
suaded, by means of a disguise, to procure entrance into the 
Vatican, and offer to the pope a fig in which poison was con- 
cealed. Clement XIV was exceedingly fond of this fruit, 
and ate it without hesitation. The same day the first symp- 



i 2 Nicolini, p. 382. 13 This bull is given by Nicolini, pp. 387-406. 



228 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

toms of severe illness were observed, and to these rapidly- 
succeeded violent inflammation of the bowels. He soon be- 
came convinced that he was poisoned, and remarked : "Alas! 
I knew they would poison me; but I did not expect to die in 
so slow and cruel a manner." His terrible sufferings con- 
tinued for several months, when he died, " the poor victim," 
says Cormenin, " of the execrable Jesuits." u 

So much has been written about the manner of this 
pope's death, that if it all were repeated, some would still 
continue to doubt about it. The Jesuits treat the foregoing 
account as a malicious libel, denouncing it with their usual 
virulence. There is this, however, to say of it, that it has 
some strong affirmative proof in the fact that a post-mortem 
examination of his body revealed the presence of poison, as 
was reported to his Government by the Spanish ambassador 
then at Rome. There are probable grounds, certainly, for 
believing that he was poisoned by the Jesuits, and that it 
was the result of their doctrine that it was not criminal, but 
rather the proper service of God, to assassinate their ene- 
mies. At all events, that opinion generally prevailed, and 
had much to do in creating the sentiment of satisfaction at 
the abolition of the- society. This satisfaction extended 
throughout all the Roman Catholic countries. There was no 
complaint against it except among the Jesuits themselves, be- 
cause, as it was the solemn act of the pope, and consequently 
of the Church, even those who may not have desired it were 
disposed to acquiesce. It pacified the minds of the great 
body of Christians, because they could see that a serious and 
exciting cause of disturbance had been removed. And an 
examination of the reasons assigned by the pope will not 
only demonstrate this, but also that it could not have been 
avoided without imperiling the Church itself as well as the 
cause of Christianity. 

We have seen how cautious Clement XIV was to ex- 
amine the whole matter thoroughly, and that for this pur- 



u Cormenin, Vol. II, p. 398. 



PAPAL SUPPRESSION OF THE SOCIETY. 229 

pose he continued the investigation for four years, in addi- 
tion to what had been previously done — hearing everything 
that could be said upon both sides, and carefully weighing 
all the evidence. He even went so far as to appoint a commis- 
sion of five cardinals and several prelates and advocates to 
assist him in the examination, 15 all of which he would have 
omitted if he had been disposed to prejudice the cause of 
the Jesuits or to inflict unmerited injury upon them. In so 
far, therefore, as his desire and intention were involved, 
there is not the least ground for supposing that he omitted 
anything essential to the discovery of the truth, or that he 
did not honestly desire to discover it. The Jesuit attacks 
upon him exhibit bad temper, but furnish no arguments. 
They are too vindictive to be courteous, and exhibit too much 
anger to be truthful. It is, therefore, only left for us of the 
present day to understand the reasons assigned by Clement 
XIV to justify his action, in order to decide intelligently be- 
tween him and the Jesuits. In his statement of facts he is 
entitled to be regarded as veracious, not only because of his 
pure Christian character, but because he is fully supported 
by the most reliable secular history. A brief review of them 
will enable the reader to place a proper estimate upon the 
character of the Jesuits, which, from the nature of their or- 
ganization, is incapable of change. 

After a preliminary statement of his powers and respon- 
sibilities, he declares the Jesuits to have been accused of 
things " very detrimental to the peace and tranquillity of the 
Christian Republic," and proceeds to enumerate the Christian 
sovereigns who have, from time to time, complained of them, 
and asserts that Pope Sixtus V had found charges against 
them "just and well founded." Referring to the favor 
shown them by Gregory XIV, he says that, notwithstanding 
this, " the accusations against the society were multiplied 
without number, and especially with their insatiable avidity 
of temporal possessions." He enumerates eleven popes, in- 



Le Jeune, Vol. I, p. 43. 



230 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

cludiDg Benedict XIV, who had "employed, without effect, 
all their efforts" to provide remedies against the evils they had 
engendered. He accuses them with opposition to "other relig- 
ious orders;" with " the great loss of souls, and great scandal 
of the people ;" with the practice of " certain idolatrous cere- 
monies ;" with the use of maxims which the Church had " pro- 
scribed as scandalous and manifestly contrary to good morals;" 
with " revolts and intestine troubles in some of the Catholic 
States;" and with "persecutions against the Church" in 
both Europe and Asia. He refers to the fact that Innocent 
XI had been compelled to restrain the society by "forbidding 
the company to receive any more novices;" that Innocent 
XIII was obliged to threaten "the same punishment;" and 
that Benedict XIV had ordered a general visitation and in- 
vestigation of all their houses in the Portuguese dominions. 
Alluding to the decree of Clement XIII in their favor, he 
says it "was rather extorted than granted" — that is, that it 
was obtained by undue means and influences — and that it 
"was far from bringing any comfort to the Holy See, or 
any advantage to the Christian Republic ;" but had made the 
times "more difficult and tempestuous," so that "complaints 
and quarrels were multiplied on every side. In some places 
dangerous seditions arose — tumults, discords, dissensions, 
scandals, which, weakening or entirely breaking the bonds 
of Christian charity, excited the faithful to all the rage of 
party hatred and enmities." Then follows the assertion that 
the Kings of France, Spain, Portugal, and Sicily had 
"found themselves reduced to the necessity of expelling and 
driving from their States, kingdoms, and provinces, these 
very Companions of Jesus," because " there remained no 
other remedy to so great evils;" and that "this step was 
necessary in order to prevent the Christians from rising one 
against the other, and for massacring each other in the very 
bosom of our common mother, the holy Church." For these 
and many other reasons, and because the Christian world 
could not be otherwise reconciled, it was urged upon him, he 



PAPAL SUPPRESSION OF THE SOCIETY. 231 

said, that the Jesuits should be "absolutely abolished and 
suppressed." 

He then proceeded to declare that he had examined atten- 
tively and weighed carefully all the matters touching the 
conduct of the Jesuits; that he had invoked "the presence 
and inspiration of the Holy Spirit;" that, under the re- 
sponsibilities of his high station, he had been compelled to 
reach the conclusion that they could " no longer produce 
those abundant fruits and those great advantages" which 
had been promised when the society was instituted ; but that, 
"on the contrary, it was very difficult, not to say impossible, 
that the Church could recover a firm and durable peace so long 
as the said society subsisted" Wherefore, for these controlling 
reasons, he announced that "after a mature deliberation, we 
do, out of our certain knowledge and the fullness of our 
apostolic power, suppress and abolish the said company" And 
to make his decree final, complete, and absolute, so that 
thereafter it should not be misunderstood, he thus pro- 
nounced his pontifical judgment: 

"We deprive it of all activity whatever, of its houses, 
schools, colleges, hospitals, lands, and, in short, every other 
place whatsoever, in whatever kingdom or province they 
may be situated. We abrogate and annul its statutes, rules, 
customs, decrees, and constitutions, even though confirmed 
by oath, and approved by the Holy See or otherwise. In 
like manner we annul all and every its privileges, indults, 
general or particular, the tenor whereof is, and is taken to 
be, as fully and as amply expressed in the present Brief as 
if the same were inserted word for word, in whatever clauses, 
form, or decree, or under whatever sanction their privileges 
may have been conceived. We declare all, and all kind of 
authority, the general, the provincials, the visitors, and other 
superiors of the said society, to he forever annulled and extin- 
guished, of what nature soever the said society may be, as 
well in things spiritual as temporal." He denies them any 
right to teach in colleges or schools — prohibits them from 



232 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

calling in question his act of suppression and abolition, and, 
after varying his language in every way necessary to show 
the inviolability of his decree, he makes this declaration : 
"Our will and pleasure is, that these our letters should for- 
ever and to all eternity be valid, permanent, and efficacious, 
have and obtain their full force and effect, and be inviolably 
observed by all and every whom they do or may conceru, 
now or hereafter, in any manner whatsoever." This solemn 
decree was then executed by the pope " under the seal of the 
Fisherman" — the highest emblem of Church authority. 16 

These extracts from the celebrated decree are necessary 
to convey to the mind of the reader a correct idea of its 
character and scope. A mere statement of the fact of its 
issuance is insufficient for that purpose. That it was the 
solemn and deliberate act of Clement XIV is not denied by 
anybody. The Jesuits assail its author, and by that means 
seek to invalidate it. They boastingly assert that it was 
unduly obtained, contrary to the Christian sentiment of that 
period. Every view suggested by them is an impeachment 
of the integrity of the pope, upon whom they have bestowed 
innumerable severe and hostile censures. Those who now 
examine the document and the circumstances which led to it, 
together with the Jesuit comments upon it, and are influenced 
only by the desire to judge it accurately, can not withhold 
their surprise at the many false and mendacious representa- 
tions made by them with regard to it. One of their most 
influential authors — seemingly insensible to the idea that 
even an adversary should be treated fairly — represents 
Clement XIV as " conscientiously opposed to the suppres- 
sion of the Jesuits," " in the very face of the fact, conceded 
by him, that he difl issue this decree in his official capacity 

16 Nicolini, pp. 387 to 406. This decree may also be found in De 
Montor, Vol. II, pp. 347 to 364. His translation differs somewhat 
from that of Nicolini, which is followed in the text, but the variance 
is not substantial in the condemnation of the society. 

"Daurignac, Vol. II, p. 173. 



PAPAL SUPPRESSION OF THE SOCIETY. 233 

as pope. This is an unequivocal charge that he violated his 
own conscience, and acted faithlessly to the Church and 
dishonorably as a man, by yielding to influences condemned 
by his judgment, and which he was too cowardly to resist. 
In ordinary intercourse such an accusation is highly offensive, 
and there is nothing to make it otherwise when made by a 
Jesuit against a pope — especially when he professes to believe 
that the latter was infallible. This same author does not 
scruple to charge that the Spanish ambassador " bribed the 
household of the sovereign poutiff, and undertook to over- 
power the pope by his indomitable persistence" 18 — as if the 
pope were surrounded by corrupt hirelings who were able to 
influence his decision, and could be overpowered upon so 
great and serious a question by the importunities and threats 
of others. And, continuing his comments in the same spirit, 
he asserts, upon the alleged authority of Cardinal Pacca, 
that after Clement XIV signed the Act of Suppression, " he 
dashed the document to one side, cast the pen to another, 
and from that moment was demented. This signature had cost 
the unhappy pontiff his reason ! From that day he pos- 
sessed it only at intervals, and fhen only to deplore his 
misfortunes." 19 

Statements of this character pertain to a low order of 
partisanship, and are discreditable to their authors. No facts 
whatsoever have ever been given, or can be, upon which to 
base them. Clement XIV lived until September 22, 1774, 
fourteen months after his decree abolishing the Jesuits. The 
French ambassador, Bernis, in a letter written at Rome, No- 
vember 3, 1773, three months and twelve days after the de- 
cree, said: "His health is perfect, and his gayety more re- 
markable than usual." 20 Nicolini says ''all the authors are 
unanimous upon this point," and quotes the historian Botta 
to the same effect. He retained this condition of health for 



is Daurignac, Vol. II, p. 175. 19 Ibid., p. 177. 
20 Apvd Nicolini, p. 412. 



234 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

eight months, when his sudden sickness gave rise, as already 
stated, to the belief that he had been poisoned by the Jes- 
uits. Certainly if he had experienced any such remorse as 
the Jesuits allege, it would have been exhibited before that 
time. After his illness his faculties may have become 
somewhat impaired, but this was the natural result of intense 
physical suffering. The Jesuits represent him, when in the 
agony of pain, as having exclaimed, "I have been com- 
pelled," which they interpret to mean that he was unduly 
influenced by the sovereigns. They fail in this to exhibit 
their usual shrewdness by deriving an argument from an ex- 
pression used by him when in what they say was a demented 
condition. If he did speak the words alleged, it is far more 
probable, as Nicolini suggests, that he intended to express 
regret that the iniquities of the Jesuits had been so enor- 
mous and so clearly established that he was compelled to 
suppress and abolish their society, because of the injury they 
had already inflicted, and would be likely to inflict in the 
future, upon the Church and Christianity. It should also 
be remarked in this connection that neither Cormenin nor 
De Montor, in their separate histories of the pontificate of 
Clement XIV, says anything about his having been de- 
mented, or about his remorse. That accusation is the fruit 
of Jesuit revenge. 

But we have now less to do with the motives of the pope 
in abolishing the society, and with the circumstances imme- 
diately attending the act, than with the act itself and its 
consequences. As pope, Clement XIV had the undoubted 
power to make and promulgate the decree. When this was 
done, it was accepted with satisfaction, not alone by the sov- 
ereigns who had made themselves accusers of the Jesuits, 
but by the great body of the European Christians. Among 
the latter the belief almost universally prevailed that he 
had thereby conferred a benefit upon the Church and the 
Christian world by removing a serious and disturbing evil. 
In the course of history no important public act has been 
more generally approved. This would have been the case 



PAPAL SUPPRESSION OF THE SOCIETY. 235 

even if but part of what is alleged in their terrible arraign- 
ment by the pope had been true. But there is every reason 
for believing that all the charges were fully verified by proof, 
and that the Christian people accepted that fact as complete 
justification for the abolition and absolute suppression of the 
societv. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

RE-ESTABLISHMENT. 

If it be conceded, as the Jesuits insist, that Clement 
XIV was prompted by unworthy and impure motives to 
abolish their society, and that, in consequence, he afterwards 
became demented from remorse, nevertheless the decree of 
abolition was an official act not subject to review or reversal 
by any authority known to the Church. No appeal from it 
was authorized by any existing law or Church regulation. 
He exercised a power which had been always understood to 
belong to the popes — of the same nature and import pre- 
cisely as that exercised by Paul III when he established the 
society. No matter whether it be called a bull, a brief, or 
by some other name, it was undoubtedly an official decree, 
pronounced by the head of the Church, acting within his 
proper, well-established, and recognized pontifical jurisdic- 
tion. Consequently, its nature can not be changed, nor can 
its scope and effect be limited, by any view that can be 
taken of his motives, any more than can the decree of a 
competent judicial tribunal be impaired in its force and effect 
by the motives or inclinations of the judge who pronounces 
it. There can, therefore, be no escape from either of these 
propositions: First, that the decree, having been issued in 
conformity with the law and custom of the Church, was 
valid; and, second, that after its issuance, the Jesuit society 
could no longer exist as a religious order, under the Canon 
law of the Church. 

It is not necessary to inquire whether or no this decree 
was binding upon subsequent popes; that has been of no 
practical importance since the new decree of Pius VII re- 
establishing the order, after it had been forty-one years 
236 



RE-ESTABLISHMENT. 237 

abolished. Until the time of that new decree, the Church 
and all its members were bound, under its existing laws and 
discipline, to recognize the abolition of the society as legiti- 
mate and proper. In point of fact this was the case, the only 
exceptions being the Jesuits themselves, and such as they 
could influence. Pius VI, the immediate successor of Clem- 
ent XIV, although he discharged from prison some of the 
Jesuits who had been arrested and confined, suffered the de- 
cree of Clement XIV to have full effect during his pon- 
tificate, and held on to the confiscated property of the Jes- 
uits for the benefit of the Church. The Christians of Europe 
were satisfied with this condition of things, and indicated 
this, not merely by their silent acquiescence, but by acts of 
positive approval. The Jesuits, however, refused to be 
reconciled, and exhibited their discontent by such measures 
of resistance as proved, beyond question, their malevolent 
hatred of Clement XIV and their contempt for the author- 
ity of the Church and the pope, when it was employed to 
curb their ambition or to impose upon them any form of 
restraint. Instances of their disobedience to popes have al- 
ready been cited; but at this particular crisis in their his- 
tory their desperation became such that they recognized 
nothing as meritorious, either in the Church or any of the 
popes, except what tended to restore to them the power they 
had forfeited by the criminality of their conduct. Their 
society was abolished pursuant to the law of the Church, and 
by its highest authority ; but they had no respect for either — 
not a whit more than they had for the papal decrees by 
which their practice of the heathen rites in India and China 
has forbidden. They sought after no other end than their 
own triumph, and to achieve this they plotted with whomso- 
ever would consent to aid them, and threw themselves into 
the arms and under the protection of the enemies of the 
Church, with the facility of such deserters as pass from camp 
to camp to find shelter for themselves. This part of their 
history presents their leading characteristics in a striking 
light, and is, perhaps, more instructive than any other, be- 



238 FOOTPRINTS OF TEE JESUITS. 

cause it shows with conspicuous prominence the little esteem 
in which they hold the Church and its legitimate authority 
when in conflict with their own purposes and designs, and 
how ready they are to curse the popes who oppose them, 
whatsoever their Christian virtues, and to praise all who favor 
them, whatsoever their vices. 

To give effect to the decree of abolition, the general of the 
Jesuits was arrested and held in confinement; the members 
were dispersed among different ecclesiastical establishments in 
Rome; their buildings were taken possession of; seals were 
placed. upon their papers; and their schools were turned 
over to the management of others. Proceedings were insti- 
tuted against Ricci, the general, and other members of the 
society, and he and the secretary, together with several of 
the prominent fathers, were sent to the Castle of St. Angelo, 
and held as State prisoners. The crimes charged against 
them, and of which they were convicted, were "that they 
had attempted, both by insinuations and by more open 
efforts, to stir up a revolt in their own favor against the 
Apostolic See ; that they had published and circulated 
through all Europe libels against the pope," in one of which 
Clement XIV was charged with having been elected by 
simony, and that three of the most prominent Jesuits, 
" Favre, Forrestier, and Gautier, were loudly repeating every- 
where that the pope was the Antichrist" 1 

The society generally, but not unanimously, exhibited 
this same spirit of resistance to the pope and the authority 
of the Church. By the decree of abolition the members 
were allowed to act as secular priests, aud exercised sacerdo- 
tal functions, subject to the authority of the Church. A few 
of them availed themselves of this provision, and "settled 
themselves quietly in different capacities." Others endeav- 
ored insidiously to preserve the principles of their constitu- 
tion and organization, by abandoning the name of Jesuits, 
and adopting other titles. "But," says Nicolini, " the greater 



^icolini, p. 411. 



RE-ESTA BLISHMENT. 239 

part, the most daring and restless, would not submit to the Brief 
of Suppresssion ; impugned its validity in a thousand writings ; 
called in question the validity of Clement's election, whom they 
called Parricide, Sacrilegious, Simoniac, and considered them- 
selves still forming part of the still existing company of Jesus." 2 

Catharine, Empress of Russia, had given some protection 
to the Jesuits before their suppression, and Ricci, the gen- 
eral, admitted in his examination that he had held corre- 
spondence with Frederick of Prussia after the decree. How 
is it to be accounted for, in any mode consistent with due 
respect for the Church, that the Jesuits in Russia did not 
withdraw themselves from the protection of the emperor, and 
that others sought shelter and protection in Prussia, after 
the decree of the pope had declared the order to be forever 
abolished throughout the world? Russia had long before re- 
jected all the overtures of the Roman Church, and established 
the Greek faith as the religion of the State, with the reigning 
sovereign as the spiritual head of the national Church. The 
Church of Rome taught that the Russians were schismatics, 
and therefore heretics. The Prussians were Lutherans — that 
is, Protestants — and were, consequently, looked upon at Rome 
as the deadly enemies of the Church, and were, besides, 
under the ban of excommunication for heresy. Conse- 
quently, an alliance of the Jesuits with either Russia or 
Prussia, after their suppression, could be looked upon in no 
other light than as an act of rebellion against the author- 
ity of the Church and the pope — a desire to pass from the 
jurisdiction of the Church of Rome to that of alien authority 
arrayed against it. It amounted to a desire to exchange 
their allegiance from what they had considered legitimate 
authority to that of schismatics and heretics. It is impossible 
for the Jesuits to escape this view of the attitude they occu- 
pied after their abolition. They were simply rebels against 
the Church. 

The Jesuits in Silesia, in Prussia, refused positively to 



2 Nicolini, p. 422. 



240 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

obey the decree of Clement XIV — paying no more regard 
to it than if it had been issued by the chief of an Arab 
tribe. They continued to hold on to their convents and 
houses in the same manner as before their suppression, in 
doing which they directly defied the pope. They relied 
upon the Lutheran Frederick for protection, preferring that 
to obedience to the pope. Frederick willingly gave them this 
protection, because he was induced to believe that he could 
employ them for the twofold purpose of strengthening mon- 
archism, to which they were pledged by their constitution, 
and of supplanting the Roman by the Protestant form of 
Christianity. The Jesuits flocked, therefore, to Silesia from 
all quarters, seeking this Protestant protection, which caused 
Voltaire to remark, in his caustic style, that "it would 
divert him beyond measure to think of Frederick as the 
general of the Jesuits, and that he hoped this would inspire 
the pope with the idea of becoming mufti." 3 

The Kings of France and Spain called the attention of 
Pius VI — after the death of Clement XIV — to this disobedi- 
ence of the Jesuits, and urged upon him the necessity of re- 
quiring that the decree of Clement XIV should be strictly 
enforced against them. But the attitude occupied by Pius 
VI required him to observe extreme caution in administering 
the affairs of the Church. As he had not been directly 
allied with either of the factions among the cardinals at the 
time of his election, he felt constrained to adopt a conserva- 
tive and moderate course, whereby he might, if possible, 
restore harmony in the Church. He therefore refrained 
from identifying himself with the sovereigns who were hostile 
to the Jesuits, and yet did not openly espouse the Jesuit 
cause. Whatsoever his personal inclinations may have been, 
he could not, as pope, venture to impugn the motives of his 
predecessor, or assail the fairness and integrity of the decree 
abolishing the Jesuits. He could not fail to realize that 
Clement XIV — a cauonically elected pope, with all the 



3 Nicolini, pp. 424-425. 



RE-ESTABLISHMENT. 241 

powers of that office in his hands — had taken the precaution to 
declare that he intended the suppression to be absolute, final, 
and forever. He knew also that, as the Jesuits had derived 
the authority to exist as a religious order from the approval 
of one pope, it was clearly competent for another pope to with- 
draw that approbation and to dissolve the order, whensoever it 
became obvious to him that the good of the Church required 
it. Under these circumstances, even if he had desired to do 
so, he manifestly was not inclined to strike what might 
prove to be a fatal and deadly blow at the dignity of the 
papal office and the authority of the Church, which he un- 
doubtedly desired to maintain in all its completeness. Con- 
sequently, he not only continued to preserve to the Church 
the confiscated property of the Jesuits, but left the decree 
suppressing the order in full force, in all its entirety, during 
his pontificate, which terminated during the last year of the 
eighteenth century. 

The Jesuit writers have taxed their ingenuity to the 
utmost to explain the attitude of Pius VI towards their 
society. They have struggled hard to prove that, notwith- 
standing he caused the decree of Clement XIV to be executed, 
he was in fact opposed to it. One of them, heretofore cited — 
whose work abounds in a mixture of apologies for their con- 
duct and vilification of their adversaries — says: " In r the 
opinion of Pius VI the Society of Jesus was disbanded o. ly 
for a time; it was not abolished."* To this it may be an- 
swered, in the first place, there is nothing to show that Pius 
VI ever so committed himself; in the second place, that 
Clement XIV decreed that it should be abolished forever; 
and in the third place that, if he had considered the society 
as suspended merely for a time, he would have revived 
it by his own decree, or fixed the tenure of suspension. 
But this method of treating the question is trifling with a 
serious matter which should be treated with fairness and 
candor. It is equivalent to saying that Pius VI executed 



4 Daurignac, Vol. II, p. 191. 

16 



242 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the decree of his predecessor, which absolutely abolished the 
society forever, when in his conscience he did not approve 
it. If he did entertain this opinion, it is not shown to have 
been authoritatively announced by him ; and to allege that 
he did, in the absence of proof to that effect, has the appear- 
ance of attempting to substitute fiction for fact — to make 
history rather than to record it. 

The Jesuits, however, draw inferences of the favorable 
estimate of their society by Pius VI from his kind treatment 
of Ricci, the general, while confined in the castle of St. 
Angelo, and his release from confinement of the other Jesuits 
who had been arrested. This is far-fetched, inasmuch as it 
may well be attributed alone to motives of benevolence. 
But in no event are these such acts as could limit, in the 
least degree, the effect of the decree of abolition so long as 
it continued in force, as it did during the pontificate of 
Pius VI. Besides, the propriety of punishing individuals 
mus«t have depended upon their personal agency in the 
offenses charged against the society as an organized body. 
The Jesuits derive more support to their claim that Pius VI 
favored them by quoting language alleged to have been 
uttered by him, which, if actually spoken, would place him 
in the attitude of being upon their side and condemning the 
decree of his predecessor, but without the courage to relieve 
them from the condemnation of their conduct or from the 
Act of Suppression. This is not very complimentary to Pius 
VI, for it represents him as saying, "I approve of the 
Society of Jesus residing in White Russia, " 5 at the same 
time that he continued his assent to their abolition in all the 
Roman Catholic States. The question whether or no he 
made this remark is in too much doubt to give full credit to 
it. It is not pretended that the words were written, but 
only that they were spoken in the presence of a single wit- 
ness, who is said to have attested their utterance. This 



»Nicolini, p. 432. 



RE-ESTABLISHMENT. 243 

would place him in the attitude of performing a public act 
contrary to his private judgment, which might well enough 
be done where temporal matters only were involved, but 
not by a pope concerning spiritual matters. Hence, it is 
scarcely to be supposed that Pius VI ever uttered these 
words. But they amount to nothing which reaches the 
dignity of an official act if he did, for the plain reason 
that the decree of abolition having been a solemn official 
act, under "the seal of the Fisherman," if subject at 
all to revocation or modification by any of the successors 
of Clement XIV, could only have been so dealt with by 
an official act of corresponding solemnity. For some causes 
judicial decrees may be changed or annulled, but only 
by other judicial decrees, and it will not be pretended, 
even by Jesuits, that a decree pronounced by a pope under 
the authority of the Canon law and the unvarying custom 
of the Church, is of less dignity than the decrees of the 
civil courts. What is said by De Montor disproves the 
allegation of Daurignac. He tells us that when the Jesuit 
general in Russia took such steps as would have enlarged the 
society by the admission of neophytes, Pius VI commanded 
him to cease. Whilst in this he does not seem to have con- 
demned the existence of the Jesuits in Russia, it emphat- 
ically approves the decree of abolition by executing it else- 
where. Not to condemn their existence in Russia was a 
simple act of omission, differing essentially from a direct ap- 
proval. But whether what he did was the one or the other, 
it undoubtedly had the effect of enabling the Jesuits in 
Russia to defy the decree of Clement XIV by keeping their 
organization alive there, so that at the death of Ricci they 
elected a successor of their own, who conducted himself and 
the society in open opposition to the Church, the pope, and 
the Canon law. 6 All, therefore, that can be justly said 
about Pius VI is, that he occupied an equivocal attitude — 



6De Montor, Vol. II, p. 406. Greisinger, p. 653. 



244 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

not willing to approve directly by any official act the exist- 
ence of the society in Russia, yet leaving the decree of sup- 
pression in full force. 

But whatsoever Pius VI may have done or said, his im- 
mediate successor, Pius VII, did "authorize the society to 
establish itself in White Russia." This he did in 1801, 
twenty-eight years after the decree of Clement XIV. It 
was not done, however, by a mere verbal declaration to that 
effect, but by a formal bull, or brief, or decree — no matter 
by what name it may be called — in observance of the usual 
formality. From this it is to be implied that there had been 
no attempt to change or limit the decree of suppression by 
Pius VI; for if there had been, this repetition would have 
been unnecessary. Pius VII manifestly understood that 
without the official solemnity of a new bull, brief, or decree, 
no effect would have followed ; that is, that his mere verbal 
assent, if he had given it, would have amounted to nothing. 
But what he did was equivocal, to say the least of it, by 
both affirming and disaffirming the decree of Clement XIV. 
It affirmed it in so far as the decree was left in force in the 
Roman Catholic States of Europe, where the jurisdiction of 
the pope as the head of the Church was recognized ; aud dis- 
affirmed it in Russia, where the pope had no jurisdiction. It 
was as much as to say that the Jesuits should not exist as an 
organized society among Roman Catholics, but might do so 
among schismatics and heretics. No matter what idea he in- 
tended to convey with regard to their abolition among the 
former, he accepted it as an accomplished fact which he was 
officially bound to recognize. To have done otherwise would 
have been perilous to the Church by inciting the opposition 
of the Roman Catholic sovereigns, who could not be recon- 
ciled to the Jesuits, and would have offended the multitude 
of European Christians who had approved their abolition. 
Up to the first year of the present century, therefore, the 
decree of Clement XIV remained unreversed throughout 
Europe, and wheresoever the jurisdiction of the pope was 
recognized. Whatsoever the Jesuits did to resist, defeat, 



RE-ESTABLISHMENT. 245 

or evade it, must, consequently, be considered willful dis- 
obedience to the recognized and legitimate authority of the 
Church ; in other words, as rebellion. 

This measure of leniency on the part of Pius VII had 
the effect upon the Jesuits of making them bolder in their 
general conduct and more vindictive in their denunciation 
of Clement XIV, whose name and memory they assailed 
with fierce and foul aspersions. They flocked to Russia in 
large numbers, as they had done to Silesia, from all the 
Roman Catholic States, and, under the guidance of their 
skillful general in that country, soon acquired the habit of 
acting as if they were sure of an ultimate revival of their 
organization. Thus sustained, it was not long before they re- 
entered Parma and Sicily, with the implied if not express 
approval of Pius VII, who seems to have been gradually 
preparing himself, by cautiously feeling his way, to espouse 
their cause and to acquiesce in their defamation of Clement 
XIV. As their hopes grew higher they began to repeat 
their old practices by venturing to interfere with the tem- 
poral affairs of Governments, as they had been accustomed 
to do before their suppression. They ventured the attempt 
to domineer in Russia as they had formerly done in Spain, 
France, Portugal, and elsewhere. Finding themselves, for a 
time, unrebuked by the Russian authorities, they carried this 
interference so far, and became so exacting in their de- 
mands, that the Russian Government was compelled, in self- 
defense, to impose restraints upon them. They had learned 
so well how to plot treason and rebellion in the Roman Cath- 
olic States as to make themselves familiar with all the arti- 
fices and instrumentalities most effective for those purposes, 
but their Russian field of operations presented difficulties 
they had not probably anticipated. The pope, whether for 
or against them, had no power there, and they were required 
to deal only with the authorities of that Government. Those 
authorities soon became convinced that they had warmed a 
viper into life, and that the Jesuits could not be trusted even 
in return for favors bestowed upon them. The Russian em- 



246 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

peror, Alexander, was consequently compelled to issue a 
royal ukase in 1816, by which he expelled them from St. 
Petersburg and Moscow. This proving ineffectual, he issued 
another in 1820, excluding them entirely from the Russian 
dominions. The emperor set forth in his decree that he had 
intrusted thera with the education of youth, and had im- 
posed no restrictions upon their right to profess and practice 
their own religion, but that they had " abused the confidence 
which was placed in them, and misled their iuexperienced 
pupils ;" that whilst they enjoyed toleration themselves, 
" they implanted a hard intolerance in the natures infatuated 
by them;" and that all their efforts " were directed merely 
to secure advantages for themselves, and the extension of 
their power, and their conscience found in every refractory 
action a convenient justification in their statutes." After 
showing how insensible they were to the duties imposed on 
them by gratitude for the protection Russia had extended 
to them after the abolition of the society by the pope, and 
charging them with the egregious crime of sowing tares and 
animosities among families, and tearing the son from the 
father, and the daughter from the mother, Alexander asks 
this emphatic and significant question : " Where, in fact, is 
the State that would tolerate in its bosom those who sow in it 
hatred and discord ?" 7 

This was the first attempt made by any State not Roman 
Catholic to expel the Jesuits, and it is not pretended, even 
by the Jesuits themselves, that it was on account of their 
religion, which the Russian Government allowed them to 
exercise freely. It must have been, therefore, the conse- 
quence of their having convinced the Russian authorities 
that they employed their religion as a pretext for their inter- 
ference with temporal and political affairs ; and that they had 
thereby made themselves rightfully amenable to the charges 
alleged against them in the ukase of the emperor. It is no 
defense against these charges to say that the emperor may 



7 Nicolini, pp. 433-434. Greismger, p. 665. 



RE-ESTABLISHMENT. 247 

have been mistaken. This is not probable ; for the fact of 
their having plotted against the peace and interests of society 
in return for the favors he bestowed upon them, would have 
justified him in condemning them even more severely. There 
are very few offenses so base as ingratitude, which excludes 
the higher emotions from the mind. He gave them shelter and 
protection after the pope and the Roman Catholic powers 
had condemned and abolished them ; and but for this they 
would have passed away forever, overwhelmed by the popu- 
lar indignation. The very fact that he found himself con- 
strained to arraign them as he did, with such crushing sever- 
ity, is convincing proof of their ingratitude, as well as of 
their inability to exist anywhere, in fidelity to their constitu- 
tion, without warring upon the peace of society and upon 
everything they are unable to subdue and control. 

It is to be presumed that the Jesuits professed submis- 
sion to Russian authority before the decree of Pius VII 
which allowed them to exist in that country. But after the 
same pope re-established the order, as he soon did, by an- 
other special decree, their schemes of ambition were more 
actively and openly plotted. This last act, which restored 
them to active life, was dated August 7, 1814, and inasmuch 
as it enabled them to reproduce all their old machinery of 
mischief, it deserves to be well considered, both as regards 
the character of the act itself, and the motives of its author. 
It constitutes one of the important events in modern history, 
the influences of which have not yet ceased, and are not 
likely to cease so long as the contest between monarchism 
and popular institutions shall continue. Pius VII was a 
monarchist in principle, besides being a temporal sovereign. 
Monarchism was seriously threatened, and was ready to 
accept whatsoever alliance its defenders deemed essential to 
its preservation. Popular government was the special dread 
of kings, and there were none of these who did not under- 
stand that nowhere else in the world was it more severely 
condemned than in the Jesuit constitution, and none who 
would rejoice more at its extermination than the members of 



248 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the Jesuit society. We should glance, therefore, at the 
condition of the European nations at the time of Pius VII, 
in order to penetrate his motives and comprehend what he 
must have regarded as the necessity which influenced him in 
aiding the Jesuits to cast reproach upon the memory of 
Clement XIV, one of the most meritorious of his prede- 
cessors. 

The French Revolution had made the attempt, in imita- 
tion of the example of the United States, to scatter the 
germs of popular representative government throughout 
Europe. Whatsoever errors sprang out of that great move- 
ment are attributable more to the pre-existing influences 
and prejudices of false education, and to the aid which 
monarchism derived from the ill-fated union of Church and 
State, than to all other causes combined. When the Eu- 
ropean States became convulsed by this event, the Jesuits 
seized upon the opportunity to persuade the reigning sover- 
eigns that the support of their society as organized by 
Loyola, was absolutely necessary to the preservation and con- 
tinuance of the principle of monarchy; and that without 
their co-operation the people, who were incapable of conduct- 
ing the affairs of government, would triumph over kings. 
They assailed liberalism in every form, from the French En- 
cyclopaedists to the humblest advocate of popular govern- 
ment, consigning all of them to eternal tortures for venturing 
to assert the natural right of mankind to civil and religious 
liberty. This was congenial w r ork to them ; for, although 
not yet re-established, they felt assured that if they could 
excite tire fears of the sovereigns at the probable loss of their 
royal authority, they would thereby set in operation a cur- 
rent of influences which would soon reach Pius VII, and 
lead him to disregard the decree of their abolition, and to 
cast his lot along with the other kings, whatsoever effect 
might be produced upon the fortunes of the Church. Loyola 
had founded the order upon the plea of its necessity to 
counteract the influences of the Reformation in the sixteenth 
century; and now in the nineteenth, the same argument was 



RE-ESTABLISHMENT. 249 

repeated, so varied only as to embrace all the existing fruits 
of the Reformation, including the right of the people to self- 
government. The Jesuits did not miscalculate. They knew 
how to excite both the fears and bigotry of the sovereigns. 
They understood Pius VII, and succeeded at last in obtain- 
ing from him the decree for their re-establishment, by virtue 
of which they have since existed, and are now scattered 
throughout all the nations, with neither their ambition nor 
thirst for power in the least degree slackened. 

Everybody at all familiar with history understands how 
necessary it was considered by the "Allied Powers" to re- 
cast the history of Europe after the escape of Napoleon from 
the Island of Elba. For this purpose their representatives 
assembled at the Congress of Vienna, and took to themselves 
the name of the " Holy Alliance," which, according to Prince 
Metternich — who was its leading spirit — was induced by "the 
overflow of the pietistic feeling of the Emperor Alexander 
[of Russia], and the application of Christian principles to pol- 
itics;" in other words, " a union of religious and political-lib- 
eral ideas." 8 This effort, on the part of the monarchists of 
Europe was designed to give renewed prominence to the idea 
that kings governed by divine right ; in other words, to es- 
tablish the union between Church and State so completely 
that it could never be again disturbed. It was intended to 
teach the people that all the liberties they were entitled to 
possess were such only as the governing monarchs deemed 
it expedient to grant them ; that they were entitled to none 
whatsoever by virtue of the natural law ; that the attempt 
to establish representative and liberal government, like that 
of the United States, was an unpardonable sin against God ; 
and that the highest duty of citizenship was obedience to 
monarchical authority. 

Not the least conspicuous among the maneuvering sover- 
eigns and politicians of Europe at this time was Pius VII, 



8 Memoirs of Prince Metternich. By Prince Metternich. Vol. I, 
page 262. 



250 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

who felt himself to be the most illustrious and important 
representative of the divine right of kings. He hated Na- 
poleon intensely, if for no other reason, because the "little 
Corsican" had arrested and held him in confinement. In 
casting about to discover by what means he, as pope, could 
render the most conspicuous aid to the cause of monarchism, 
and the suppression of liberal and popular government, he 
naturally turned in the direction of the Jesuits, whose fidelity 
to the principles of absolutism was vouched for by the con- 
stitution of their society and their intense devotion to the 
memory of Loyola. He, accordingly, whilst the monarchs 
were preparing for the Congress of Vienna, and ouly a few 
months before its assembling, anticipated their action by re- 
establishing the society of the Jesuits. His prompt action 
commended him to the allied sovereigns, who could not have 
failed to see in it sufficient to assure them of his hostility to 
popular government and his fidelity to the monarchical 
cause. His purposes may be inferred from the language of 
his decree. He declared that he should be derelict of duty, 
"if placed in the bark of Peter, tossed and assailed by con- 
tinual storms, we [he] refused to employ the vigorous and ex- 
perienced roivers [the Jesuits], who volunteered their services, 
in order to break the waves of a sea which threatened every 
moment shipwreck and death." 9 What did he mean by the 
storms that tossed and assailed the bark of Peter? The Gov- 
ernments were agitated by political and military turmoil, but 
these things were not within the rightful province of the 
Church or the pope. The Church was at peace, except in 
so far only as Pius VII had voluntarily chosen to mix him- 
self up with the political struggles of kings, in order to pre- 
serve his own temporal crown. That he intended to be- 
come an active party to these struggles is proved by all that 
he said and did — even by the language of his decree. In 
explaining his action, he says that Ferdinand, King of Sic- 
ily, had requested the re-establishment of the Jesuits, because 



9 Mcolini, p. 445. 



RE-ESTABLISHMENT. 251 

it was necessary that they should be employed as instructors 
" in forming youth to Christian piety and fear of God." 
Ferdinand was, one of the most bigoted kings and thorough 
monarchists in Europe, and his idea of "Christian piety and 
fear of God " was, that it centered in the divine right of 
kings and the union of Church and State. With him re- 
ligion and monarchism were synonymous terms. If he 
sometimes made small concessions to his subjects from fear of 
the popular wrath, they were always withdrawn when his 
power became strong enough to enable him to renew his op- 
pressions with impunity. He acted upon the Jesuit principle 
that a monarchical sovereign is not bound by any promise 
he makes to his subjects, for the reason that the latter have 
no rights which the former are bound to recognize, and if 
they had, that the pope could release him from the obliga- 
tion to obey his promise — a doctrine then strictly adhered to 
so as to make popular institutions impossible. His main 
purpose was to perpetuate his own temporal and political 
authority, and he desired to employ the Jesuits for that pur- 
pose, well knowing that their doctrines were expressly de- 
signed to hold society in obedience to monarchism. Pius 
VII did not hesitate to avow his sympathy with Ferdinand, 
and in doing so proved that he was influenced by the same 
temporal and political motives. He considered it necessary 
that the crown of absolute sovereignty should be kept upon 
the head of Ferdinand, in order to assure himself that it 
should be kept also upon his own. The sovereigns of the 
"Holy Alliance" had massed large armies, and soon entered 
into a pledge to devote them to the suppression of all up- 
rising*! of the people in favor of free government; and he 
desired to devote the Jesuits, supported by his pontifical 
power, to the accomplishment of that end. He knew how 
faithfully they would apply themselves to that work, and 
hence he counseled them, in his decree of restoration, to 
strictly observe the " useful advices and salutary counsels'' 
whereby Loyola had made absolutism the corner-stone of the 
society. 



252 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

Thus the motives of Pius VII are clearly shown to have 
been temporal and political, and when he excused himself 
on account of the "deplorable times" — that is, the political 
disturbance among the nations — he manifestly had in view 
the advancement of those plottings against popular liberty 
which soon furnished the rallying point to the "Holy Alli- 
ance" at Vienna. He seems to have been so intent upon 
this subject as not to realize that he owed at least some show 
of respect to the memory of Clement XIV. As if uncon- 
scious that when the latter abolished the society, he also was 
the head of the Church, possessing all the powers and pre- 
rogatives of a lawfully-elected pope, he abrogated and an- 
nulled his decree as if it had possessed no higher dignity than 
a municipal ordinance, imitating in this the practice of those 
sovereigns who brush all impediments out of the paths of 
their ambition. He conferred upon the Jesuits the right to 
exist as an order throughout the world, and thereby ap- 
proved and indorsed their vilification of Clement XIV. 
And to show his own estimate of the plenitude of his pon- 
tifical authority, he declared that his decree of restoration 
should be " inviolably observed," and that it should "never 
be submitted to the judgment or revision of any judge." 
And then, as if he stood in the place of God, whilst Clem- 
ent XIV had rebelled against the Divine authority, he com- 
manded that " no one be permitted to infringe, or by an 
audacious temerity to oppose any part" of his decree; and 
made disobedience to it an act of sin, by declaring that he 
who shall be guilty of it " will thereby incur the indignation 
of Almighty God, and of the holy apostles Peter and Paul." 
He treated contemptuously the decree of Clement XIV, 
without the least pretense that the Jesuits had repented of 
the crimes for which he abolished their society after four 
years of careful investigation, and without any pledge upon 
their part not to repeat them — a serious and dangerous 
omission. 10 



18 Nicolini, p. 447. 



RE-ESTABLISHMENT, 253 

One can not refrain from wondering why Pius VII did 
not pause long enough to inquire, " Upon what meat doth 
this our Csesar feed, that he is grown so great ?" What 
source of pontifical authority existed in his behalf that did 
not also exist in behalf of Clement XIV? The one was no 
more pope than the other — no more infallible than the 
other — possessed no higher official prerogatives than the 
other. They were equals in power and official dignity. If 
Clement XIV had suspended the society, then it would have 
been within the power of Pius VII to set aside the suspen- 
sion and revive the society. But he went further, and in 
the most emphatic and express terms, suppressed, abolished, 
annulled, and extinguished it forever. His official act was 
valid, complete, and final, in compliance with the Canon 
law and established custom. The society, therefore, had no 
legal existence according to the law of the Church, but was 
dead and extinct when Pius VII became pope. Its constitu- 
tion was then a nullity. He had nghtfully only the power 
possessed by Paul III when he first established the society ; 
and by exercising this power could have organized a new so- 
ciety and granted it a new constitution. Instead of this he 
"re-established" the defunct society, at the request of King 
Ferdinand, thereby assuming the prerogative right to review 
and annul what Clement XIV had done within the scope 
of his legitimate authority. In order to do this, he had 
further to assume that Clement XIV had exceeded his au- 
thority, and had acted injuriously towards the Church, by 
depriving it of " the vigorous and experienced rowers" nec- 
essary to save it 'from " shipwreck and death." This was, in 
effect, to approve the Jesuit defamation of Clement XIV, 
and to deny his infallibility. It was, moreover, an implied 
approval of the rebellion of the Jesuits against the author- 
ity of the Church during the forty-one years that had 
elapsed after the abolition of their society. It was an at- 
tempt to cover up, sanction, and legitimate that rebellion, and 
to reward the society for its persistent defiance of the Church 
and the Canon law, by galvanizing its dead body into life. 



254 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

» 
The Jesuits themselves are sensible of this difficulty, and 
are perplexed by it. In dealing with it, Daurignac displays 
more ingenuity than candor. Referring to the existence of 
the Jesuits in White Russia, after the decree of abolition 
and in violation of it, he ventures to say : "The position of 
the Jesuits in White Russia was an anomaly. Clement XIV 
had authorized them to remain in statu quo." u He fails to 
give any authority for this, for the obvious reason that there 
is none. Nothing can be found to verify it. It is undoubt- 
edly of Jesuit manufacture, being contradicted by everything 
done and said by Clement XIV. The language of his de- 
cree is conclusive upon the point that his object was to de- 
stroy the society aud put an end to it forever — not allowing 
it to exist anywhere. He makes neither exception nor 
reservation. Any other pretense is a palpable perversion of 
his meaning. Daurignac manifestly realized this difficulty, 
and made an additional effort to escape it by attempting to 
impair the official force and effect of the decree of abolition. 
He says elsewhere: "In view of the future, he [Clement 
XIV] would not suppress the society by a bull, which would 
be binding upon his successors. He had suppressed it by a 
brief, which could be revoked without difficulty whenever 
public feeling might allow it." 12 The Jesuits have an "ex- 
chequer of words" from which they draw at pleasure, employ- 
ing them to express or conceal the truth as shall be necessary 
to advance their interests or improve their fortunes. Here 
there is an attempt to interpret the meaning of the decree, 
not by the plain language it contains, but by the name given 
to the instrument itself. In what does the difference be- 
tween a bull and a brief consist ? If there is any, it must 
arise out of the subject-matter involved, and not otherwise. 
One can conceive that a pope may regulate some inferior 
affairs, touching matters not essential to the universal Church, 
by an order or decree called a brief, in which case he or his suc- 
cessors may revoke it. But where such an order or decree con- 



11 Daurignac, Vol. II, p. 195. 12 Ibid., p. 177. 



RE-ESTABLISHMENT. 255 

cerns the universal Church, it must be considered a bull, be- 
cause in that case, according to the Jesuit theory, it partakes 
of infallibility, and can not be revoked — for the reason that 
whatsoever is infallible must stand for good or bad. The 
decree of Clement XIV is found in the " Roman Bullarium" 
preserved in the Vatican at Rome. 13 There could have been 
no other purpose in placing it there than to attach to it the 
same dignity and effect as the bulls of other popes among 
which it is recorded. When thus deposited it was undoubt- 
edly considered irrevocable, because it related to a religious 
order which could exist only by authority of the pope repre- 
senting the whole Church. When the pope acts with refer- 
ence to a religious order, he decides whether or no it is capa- 
ble of fulfilling its professions. He then acts with reference 
to faith, and his act is therefore ex cathedra. Upon this 
ground, according to Jesuit teaching, he is infallible in 
whatsoever opinion he expresses, because it is within the do- 
main of both faith and morals. Hence, in the discussion of 
the question " When does the Church speak infallibly ?" a 
recent Roman Catholic author of accepted authority says 
that, as the Church can never be "an unreliable guide, it 
follows that she can not err when she seals a religious order 
with her formal approbation." u Of course, no argument is 
necessary to prove that if the pope is infallible in establish- 
ing a religious order, he is equally so in abolishing and an- 
nulling an existing one, upon the ground expressed by Clem- 
ent XIV, that the good of the universal Church and the 
cause of Christianity demanded it, and also upon the ad- 
ditional ground that the subject-matter is the same. This 
proposition can not be escaped by substituting assertion for 
argument. 

This same Jesuit author, Daurignac, is inconsistent. 
Seeming to forget that he had called the decree of Clement 
XIV a mere brief, which any of his successors could annul, 

13 De Montor, Vol. II, p. 347. 

14 When Does the Church Speak Infallibly? By Thomas Francis 
Knox, of the London Oratory. Page 67. 



256 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

when he comes afterwards to speak of that issued by Pius 
VII, he calls it a " bull" and frequently refers to it as such. 15 
Having previously laid his foundation by insisting that Pius 
VII regarded the preservation of the Jesuits by the Emperor 
of Russia as " the interposition of Divine Providence in be- 
half of the society " 16 — that is, that Clement XIV had in- 
curred the Divine displeasure when he abolished the society — 
he never loses sight of the idea that the decree of Pius VII 
bears the stamp of infallibility, and can neither be annulled 
nor modified. This is a subtle method of statement, but is 
without the force of argument. It is simply Jesuitical. 

These matters derive their present importance from the 
fact that they show how the Jesuits have become familiar 
with crooked paths. They show also the wonderful adroit- 
ness with which they have pursued these paths for many 
years, and how they have surmounted difficulties which 
would have overwhelmed any other body of men. As they 
have never been known, at any period of their history, to 
abate any of their demands or pretensions, they are to-day, as 
they have always been, a standing menace against every form 
of popular self-government and whatsoever else is the fruit 
of the Reformation. Their rules of conduct are still derived 
from the teachings of Loyola, who, accepted by them as oc- 
cupying the place of God, they regard as higher authority 
than any human law or any Government where the sovereign 
power is guaranteed to the people. 



15 Daurignac, p. 217. 16 Ibid., p. 205. 



CHAPTER XV. 

RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 

The decree abolishiDg the Jesuits was accepted by all the 
Roman Catholic sovereigns and people of Europe as final. 
It was an exercise of the highest authority of the Church. 
But it was not accepted by the Jesuits, who, in contempt of 
this authority, brooded over the purpose to plot stealthily 
against it until they could obtain its revocation from some 
sympathizing and pliable pope. Their position was that of 
condemned criminals — compelled to recognize the authority 
and jurisdiction of their triers, while secretly endeavoring to 
find or to create some antagonistic authority from which they 
could obtain a grant of pardon, or a revival of their power 
to repeat their offenses without pardon. It counted nothing 
with them that Clement XIV was canonically pope — their 
own interest outweighed anything that concerned either 
pope or Church. They were willing to obey the Church 
provided the Church favored their society, but not other- 
wise. Consequently, it may be said of t 1 . phi then, as at all 
other times, that they recognized no otluT form of Chris- 
tianity than that which centered in Jesuitism, and no other 
authority than that of their general at Rome. 

When re-established, they came out from their hiding- 
places, and appeared again in all the centers of European 
influence. Their numbers were sufficient to show that, in- 
stead of having considered their society abolished — as they 
were commanded to do by the decree of Clement XIV — 
their organization had been secretly and defiantly preserved, 
without any departure from the principles of the constitu- 
tion, any abatement of their pretensions, or any perceptible 
diminution in their numbers. Each one reappeared in the 

17 257 



258 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

old armor of the order — reburnished for use again. The 
weapons which Loyola had forged for deadly warfare against 
Protestantism were re-issued to the ''sacred militia" of the 
order, and its drilled and submissive battalions renewed 
their old and familiar battle-cry, announcing their determina- 
tion never to lay down their arms until all the fruits and 
consequences of the Reformation were exterminated. The 
possibility of achieving that result stimulated their ardor 
afresh ; and they became more earnestly united than ever in 
the cause of the Bourbon monarchs, when they realized that 
Pins VII had assured the " Holy Alliance" that all the powers 
of the papacy should be employed to that end, and that they 
were to be placed, as the special champions of retrogression, 
in the forefront of the conflict. The times were such that 
they drew fresh inspiration from them. The jealousies and 
rivalries among the sovereigns had thrown all Europe into 
tumult. The French Revolution had been productive of 
consequences which created a flame of intense excitement, 
reaching the outer circumference of the Continent. Society 
was thrown into an agitated and perturbed condition, and the 
foundations of the strongest Governments were threatened. 
The appearance of Napoleon had alarmed the hereditary 
sovereigns. He had succeeded in striking what they feared 
would be a fatal blow at the doctrine of the divine right 
and hereditary descent of royal powers. He had shattered 
Governments hh i destroyed dynasties with reckless au- 
dacity, in order to build up new Governments and dynasties 
obedient to himself. The reigning monarchs were dismayed 
at the rapidity and success of his movements — being unable 
to anticipate when or where his quick and decisive blows 
would strike. But when his star waned, they again applied 
their united energies to the revival of their claim of divine 
right and to a closer union of Church and State. They 
could not fail to see that monarchism was threatened with 
defeat unless some agencies could be discovered whereby the 
unwary populations who were striving after freedom could 
be brought back again into the net which the papacy and 



RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 259 

secular monarchs had spent centuries in weaving. These 
terrified sovereigns were seemingly relieved from their em- 
barrassing fears when Pius VII ventured to bring to their 
aid what he intended should be the whole power of the 
Church, by restoring life to the dissolved society of Jesuits. 
They must have rejoiced as drowning men do when seiz- 
ing upon some object that saves them. The Jesuit spirit 
did not need to be revived, for it had never been sup- 
pressed ; and therefore they reappeared fully panoplied for 
the renewal of the battle against civil and religious liberty, 
the popular right of self-government, and all the beneficent 
influences of the Reformation. 

Sympathizing with Ferdinand IV of Naples — the most 
bigoted monarch in Europe, at whose instance they were 
restored — the Jesuits selected such points of operation as 
would enable them to strike their hardest blows at the free- 
dom of speech, of the press, and of religious belief; well 
knowing that where these were allowed, they gave birth to 
the principle of popular self-government where it did not 
exist, and strengthened and maintained it where it did. 
They were encouraged by all who supported the alliance be- 
tween the papacy and the allied sovereigns, upon the ground 
that the parties to that alliance were endeavoring to keep 
Church and State united, as the only certain guarantee 
for preserving monarchism. They were consequently ac- 
cepted as co-workers in the cause of absolute imperialism 
and the enemies of every form of government where the 
people possess the right of sovereignty. The flag under 
which they marched had upon it all the symbols of despot- 
ism, and no room for a single star to indicate the light of 
modern progress and development. Having thus reached 
again a condition of apparent security, they were attracted 
to Rome by the patronage of the papacy, and the value 
of their alliance was recognized by the papal authorities, 
as may be seen in the fact that they had restored to them 
their property which Clement XIV had confiscated, together 
with the Roman and German colleges at Rome, and a num- 



260 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

ber of churches. They became more powerful than ever in 
the States of the Church, and succeeded in bringing all Italy 
under the dictatorship of their general, except Sardinia and 
Piedmont, where, in order to avoid a direct breach with the 
pope, they were tolerated, but not installed. They moved 
about through Europe, openly where they could do so safely, 
and secretly where they could not — rejoicing when they wit- 
nessed the triumph of monarchism over the rights of the 
people. Wheresoever a battle was to be fought against these 
rights, they always aided and encouraged the cause of political 
despotism. If, in the contests of that period, a single Jesuit 
could have been found in the ranks of the people, except to 
betray them, he would have been anathematized by his 
society. 

The reintroduction of the Jesuits into Spain teaches a les- 
son which should not be forgotten. The king, Ferdinand 
VII, proved himself to be one of the most faithful of their 
royal pupils. After he had succeeded in becoming freed 
from the grasp of Napoleon, and returned to his kingdom, he 
found an existing constitution by which the Spanish people, 
in his absence, had placed wholesome limitations upon the 
royal power. With a view to regain possession of authority, 
he made a solemn pledge that he would obey this constitution 
and see that it was enforced. Having succeeded, he proved 
by his subsequent conduct that he was thoroughly conversant 
with, and wholly approved, the Jesuit doctrine that a mon- 
arch is not bound by any promise made to his subjects, or by 
any oath to obey it, because his authority is divine, and the 
jieople possess no rights which he does not of his own accord 
concede to them. Consequently, when safely in possession of 
the throne — with Jesuit emissaries crowding about his court 
to dictate his policy and pardon his perjury — he traitorously 
proceeded to abolish the Cortes, the legislative body of the 
nation, and grasp the scepter of absolute government in his 
own hands. He restored the infamous Inquisition, and the 
cruelty of his despotism was exhibited in the number of vic- 
tims who suffered death during his reign of terror. How 



HE-ENTERING SPAIN. 261 

such a monarch should have enjoyed the favor and protec- 
tion of Pius VII — the head of the Church — almost passes in- 
telligent co m prehension; how he had the approval of the 
Jesuits is well understood. His enormities became so great, 
at last, that the Roman Catholic people of Spain, weary of 
his persecutions, and realizing that the nation could not live 
unless they were arrested, resorted to revolution to avenge 
wrongs they could endure no longer, and proclaimed a con- 
stitutional form of government, whereby they guaranteed 
such popular rights as they deemed essential to their own 
welfare. But the Jesuits were present to counsel the per- 
jured king, and, accepting their casuistical teachings as his 
guide, he assented to this new constitution, and by the repe- 
tition of his solemn promise to observe it, turned away the 
popular vengeance. Thus he gained time to renew his royal 
strength, and when he subsequently found the nation seem- 
ingly slumbering in a sense of security, again stamped his 
feet upon the constitution, reassumed his arbitrary authority 
asking by diviue right, independently of the people, forfeited 
his honor by repeating his perjury, and plunged Spain into 
the deepest misery. This perjured tyrant was cursed by the 
Roman Catholic people of Spain, and his enormities drove 
the Roman Catholic populations of Spanish America to as- 
sert their independence. When he had the royal power in 
his hands he brought the Inquisition and the Jesuits back to 
Spain ; when the people were enabled to enforce the consti- 
tution, they drove the Jesuits out of the country. He knew 
his friends, and the people knew their enemies. But with all 
the infamies of his conduct resting upon him, he was favored 
and applauded by Pius VII and venerated by the Jesuits. 
The contemporaneous events are full of instruction. 

To accomplish the objects announced at Vienna, the 
' ' Holy Alliance" met again in Congress at Verona, where 
the sovereigns pledged themselves, in the most solemn form, 
that they would continue to prevent the establishment of 
popular governments, and would unite all their energies in 
preserving monarchical institutions where tjiey existed, and 



262 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

in re-establishing them where they had been set aside by the 
people. 1 The adoption of a constitution by Spain was con- 
sidered as in conflict with this decision at Verona, and prep- 
arations were at once made to defeat it. Louis XVIII, of 
France, as one of the allied sovereigns who had undertaken 
to preserve monarchism and defeat all popular Governments 
at every hazard, marched an army into Spain for the sole 
purpose of subduing the people and setting the constitution 
aside, so that the state of things that had so long existed 
under Ferdinand VII should continue. It was this un- 
natural and unjust war that carried back the Inquisition and 
the Jesuits to Spain. Nothing could have been more grate- 
ful to the Jesuits, because they thought they could see in it 
the triumph of monarchism over the people. They followed 
this army of invasion with as much delight as famishing 
people go to a feast. That they exulted when it succeeded 
in overthrowing the constitution, and when they saw the feet 
of the perfidious Ferdinand VII again upon the necks of 
the Spanish people, no reader of history will doubt. They 
" nestled themselves in the country," says Greisinger, "more 
firmly than ever," seemingly encouraged by the hope that 
the cause of popular rights was lost forever among the 
Roman Catholic population of Spain. But this unrighteous 
triumph was short-lived. Another crisis in the affairs of 
Spain occurred upon the death of Ferdiuand VII, when, 
after a bloody civil war of six or seven years, the ill-fated 
Isabella was placed upon the throne, and another liberal con- 
stitution was proclaimed — not entirely republican, it is true, 
but sufficiently representative in form to arrest the usurpa- 
tions of absolutism and assure the ultimate triumph of pop- 
ular liberty. Once more the Roman Catholic people of 
Spain signalized their victory over absolutism by driving the 
Jesuits out of the country, and avowing their determination 



1 This gave rise to what is known as the Monroe Doctrine, which 
declares that the United States will consider it threatening to their 
own independence if European Governments shall interfere with that 
ot any of the American States. 



RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 263 

that they would no longer be endangered by their presence 
or annoyed by their intrigues. And thus the Jesuits were 
compelled to find congenial fields of operations elsewhere in 
Europe, among those who regarded a constitutional and 
representative form of government as an offense against the 
divine law, the people as fit only for servitude, and absolute 
monarchs as " booted and spurred to ride them." 

Those familiar with the hatred the Spanish people enter- 
tained for the Jesuits — not only on account of their bad influ- 
ences over Ferdinand VII, but because of the tendency of 
their doctrines to convert men into machines and blunt their 
moral sensibilities — are not surprised at the detestation in 
which they were held in Germany. The Spanish people 
had long been known for obedience to the Roman Church, 
but had reached a point of intelligence which enabled them 
to understand the difference between the Church and the 
papacy, and, therefore, they would not permit even Pius VII 
to force the Jesuits upon them — a fact of great significance 
in forming a true estimate of their character. In Germany, 
however, where the Reformation began, the remembrance of 
their former vicious career had not died out, the opposition 
to them after their re-establishment was more intense than it 
had been before their suppression ; for as the German people 
increased in enlightenment they were better able to see and 
understand the irreconcilable hostility of the Jesuits to intel- 
lectual development and constitutional government. Their 
own experience had taught them that reconciliation and con- 
cord between Protestants and Roman Catholics were not only 
possible, but desirable ; and they had learned, from that 
same experience, that, as the Jesuits had participated in all 
the measures designed to strike down constitutional govern- 
ments established by Roman Catholic populations, their de- 
light would be increased if, with the same weapons, they 
could destroy similar governments established by Protestants. 
Therefore, the German people built around themselves a wall 
of defense in their own intellectual enlightenment, which Jes- 
uit craft and ingenuity has in vain endeavored to undermine. 



264 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

France, Austria, and Bavaria were all Roman Catholic 
countries. France had not forgotten the former fierce and 
protracted conflict which had given the Gallican Christians 
their cherished liberties, by assuring to the Government the 
control of its temporal affairs without papal interference. 
The recollection of this revived also the remembrance of the 
fact that the Jesuits had been expelled because of their 
efforts to destroy these liberties. And, hence, after their re- 
establishment, even Louis XVIII, with his evident partial- 
ity for them as the untiring defenders of absolute monarch- 
ism, was unable, although backed by Pius VII, to allow 
them again openly to re-enter France. Neither in Austria 
nor Bavaria had there ever been any such struggle as in 
France ; but, nevertheless, the indignation felt towards the 
Jesuits by the people of both these countries was so undis- 
guised that neither Francis I in the former, nor Maximilian 
Joseph in the latter, dared to brave public opinion by allow- 
ing them free access to either kingdom. These impediments, 
however, only offered to the Jesuits the opportunity to prac- 
tice the arts of dissimulation and deception with which they 
are made familiar by their method of educational training. 
They surreptitiously entered France under the name of 
11 Peres de la Foi" or "Fathers of the True Faith," and Aus- 
tria and Bavaria under that of "Redemptionists." 2 They 
did not venture, in either of these countries, to avow them- 
selves openly as Jesuits, because of the almost universal in- 
dignation felt towards them by these Roman Catholic popu- 
lations. But gaining admission among them by these false 
pretenses, they understood well, by skillful training, how to 
proceed. Having penetrated the skirmish-line of the enemy, 
they could survey the whole field of battle, and plan accord- 
ingly. Every Jesuit who stealthily crept into France or 
Austria or Bavaria, under these masks of hypocrisy, stood 
towards the people of these countries as the Italian bandit 
does to his unsuspecting victim, — ready to strike home his 



2 Greisinger, pp. 670 to 074. 



RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 265 

stiletto in the dark. It should excite no wonder, therefore, 
that, with Pius VII and the allied sovereigns upon their 
side — all maintaining the divine right to govern, and deny- 
ing that of the people — these incendiary Jesuits were en- 
abled, at last, to avow openly the name and existence of 
their order, and to become scattered in" all directions, under 
the shelter of papal and imperial protection. Thus sup- 
ported, they extended themselves over the adjacent States, 
even as far as Rhenish Prussia, opened their colleges and 
schools, and permitted but little time to elapse before they 
assumed their former dictatorship over Governments and peo- 
ples. Since then they have again revived their old imperial 
airs among all the nations, especially where they have found 
shelter under liberal institutions, and seem to be again in- 
spired by the hope, if not the belief, that their ultimate 
triumph over Protestantism is assured, and that Roman 
Catholic populations will bow down before them as the only 
divinely appointed exponents of the true apostolic faith. 

Pius VII was encouraged by the success of the Jesuits, 
and endeavored first to make them available in France to 
promote the interests of the papacy. Finding Louis XVIII 
submissive to his authority, he proposed to him a Concordat 
with provisions intended to destroy the Gallican liberties, 
and bring France into the condition struggled after so hard 
by Boniface VIII; that is, of absolute submission to the 
papacy in temporal as well as spiritual affairs. Louis XVIII 
was weak enough to agree to this Concordat, manifestly under 
Jesuit influence. But the Roman Catholic people of France 
were not so easily entrapped as the pope and the king had 
supposed ; and the latter soon learned that even his royal 
authority was not sufficient to enforce this odious measure. 
He was compelled, therefore, by the force of public senti- 
ment, to abandon it, although France still submitted to the 
presence of the Jesuits. The failure of the Condordat, how- 
ever, was a sore defeat; but defeat only incensed the pas- 
sions of Pius VII. 

The hatred of the Jesuits in Germany was shared alike by 



266 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

Protestants and Roman Catholics. These two bodies of Chris- 
tians agreed that they would unite in maintaining freedom of 
worship ; that is, they would return to the old order of things, 
w 7 hich existed before peace and harmony had been disturbed 
by the Jesuits at their first appearing in Germany. They 
signed a Concordat to that effect, and sent it to Pius VII for 
his approval, intending that he should realize how easy it was 
for Christians to live together in harmony, notwithstanding 
differences of religious belief prevailed among them. The im- 
portance of this movement can not be overestimated. If 
the pope had thrown his great influence in its favor, its bene- 
ficial results would have been universally felt. But Pius 
VII, seeming not to know that such a union among Christians 
was possible, positively and peremptorily refused his assent 
to this just and liberal arrangement, declaring that it would 
"compromise his temporal and spiritual power." All classes 
of German Christians — howsoever they otherwise differed — 
rebuked his illiberality, and adhered to their conciliatory 
course towards each other. Pius VII, realizing the necessity 
of fulfilling his obligation to the allied sovereigns, and of 
keeping the Jesuits in the active service of the papal and 
imperial cause, became intensely excited at this German per- 
sistence, and expressed his indignation in strong language. 
His course is thus explained by Cormenin : "He rallied 
around him the kings of the Holy Alliance, declared a ter- 
rible war against liberal ideas, fulminated excommunications 
against the Democrats of France, the Illuminati of Germany, 
the Radicals of England, and the Carbonari of Italy," 3 which 
includes everything that tended, at that period, towards 
liberalism and popular government. Manifestly, however, 
his anger was specially aroused at the thought of religious 
toleration, which, looked at from the papal standpoint, meant 
the loss of monarchical power and, consequently, heresy. 

With this tremendous combination confronting them — 
composed, as it was, of the papacy, the allied sovereigns, 



3 Coruieuin, Vol. II, pp. 424-425. 



RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 267 

and the Jesuits — what other remedy but revolution was 
within reach of the people? How else could they prevent 
the continued union of Church and State, the complete 
triumph of monarchism, and the crushing defeat of constitu- 
tional and popular government? Nobody needs to be told 
to what extremities the allied sovereigns were ready and 
willing to go to accomplish these results; and when supported 
by a pope like Pius VII, and he by the Jesuits, whose society 
he had re-established for that express purpose, they possessed 
an organization of such a character, so formidable and vast 
in its proportions, that there was left to the multitude no 
other possibility of escape than by asserting, as the people 
of the United States had done, their natural right to civil 
and religious liberty. No question about the form of relig- 
ious faith was involved, except in so far as the pope, the 
allied sovereigns, and the Jesuits were united in maintaining 
that the only true religion was that based upon the joint 
monarchism of Church and State — in other words, that the 
faculties of the human mind should remain undeveloped in 
order to fit the people for inferiority and passive obedience 
to authority. 

Hence, when the Roman Catholic populations came to 
realize what Protestantism had done in a few centuries to 
enlighten and elevate multitudes of people, it required but 
little intelligent thought to see that the combination which 
threatened to deprive them of liberties essential to their wel- 
fare was violative of the true faith of the Church they re- 
vered, and from whose proper teachings they were unwilling 
to depart. They could readily understand that it was the 
papacy, and not the Church, that had led them to the very 
edge of a fearful precipice. They were animated by the 
inspiring influence of liberty — always broad, generous, con- 
ciliatory. Yielding, therefore, to the instinctive teachings of 
nature, they found themselves no less desirous than others to 
enjoy the protection of constitutional government, and no 
less willing than others to resort to the ultimate remedy of 
revolution when assured that their just rights could not 



268 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

otherwise be obtained. Thus only are we enabled to account 
intelligently for the revolutions in the Roman Catholic 
States — organized, as they were, to resist the tremendous 
conspiracy of European monarchists, iu both Church and 
State, to defeat the formation of popular constitutional 
governments, and to overthrow them where they had been 
formed. 

These revolutions followed each other so rapidly as to 
prove the existence of a common purpose ; and the nearer 
they were to Rome, the more violent were the passions which 
incited and followed them. The masses of the people were 
unwilling to submit longer to their own humiliation, even 
iu face of the fact that Pius VII had, by assuming infal- 
libility never authorized, placed the Church in the attitude 
of approving the doctrines and purposes of the " Holy Al- 
liance." They accepted, with reverential fidelity, the faith 
proclaimed by " the fathers" of the Apostolic Age, the Con- 
ciliar Decrees and the true traditions of the Church, but 
were unwilliug to have it perverted by either the papacy or 
the Jesuits, so that it should be made the pretext for holding 
them and their posterityl iu vassalage. They courageously 
determined, therefore, to free themselves from bondage — 
being no longer willing to be bound with fetters, whether 
drawn from the arsenals of the papacy or newly forged in the 
workshops of the Jesuits. These revolutions might have 
been avoided, and might have been arrested after they broke 
out, by the authority of the Church in the hands of a pope 
less intent upon the possession of temporal and monarchical 
powers than Pius VII, and less willing than he to patronize 
the Jesuits and participate in the purposes of the "Holy 
Alliance" for political and ambitious ends. But Pius VII 
was constrained by the circumstances surrounding him, as the 
representative of the papacy, to discard all other considera- 
tions except such as promised success to the allied powers, to 
whose triumph over the people he contributed, as far as he 
could, all the authority of the Church. To him the Jesuits 
appeared merely as " experienced rowers," who could "break 



RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 269 

the waves" of the revolutionary sea; and having taken them 
on board the papal bark, freighted with the richest treas- 
ures, he defied alike the complaints of the oppressed peoples 
and the dangers of shipwreck. 

That Pius VII was not disposed to abate in the least the 
claim to universal sovereignty which some of his predecessors 
had asserted for the papacy, and was therefore incompetent 
to deal compromisingly with any of the pending questions, 
is abundantly demonstrated by the history of his pontificate. 
His assumption that he occupied God's place upon earth, 
and was so clothed with divine authority that no human 
tribunal could rightly inquire into his conduct or motives, 
placed him in the attitude of bold defiance to the sentiment 
of liberalism then rapidly permeating the whole body of the 
people. He mistook the papal dogmas of Gregory VII, 
Innocent III, and Boniface VIII, and a few other popes, for 
the Christian doctrines of the nineteenth century. After 
Napoleon had extended the empire of France over Italy, it 
became necessary to adjust the relations between the spiritual 
and the temporal powers. He accordingly addressed a letter 
to Pius VII, wherein he said: "I will touch in nothing the 
independence of the Holy See ;" that is, that in all spiritual 
matters he would leave the independence of the pope undis- 
turbed. He made this clear by continuing : " Your holiness 
will have for me in temporals the same regard I bear for 
you in spirituals." The obvious meaning of Napoleon was 
that Church and State should be separated, and that each 
should be independent of the other in its own proper sphere. 
The pope was to be left "sovereign in Home," with all the 
temporal powers necessary to local government, but Napoleon 
should remain the emperor with the general jurisdiction per- 
taining to that office. In effect it was, substantially, a res- 
toration of the relations which existed between the Church 
and the Emperors Constantine and Charlemagne. 

If Pius VII had accepted this proposition, it would have 
gone far towards allaying the revolutionary excitement in 
Europe, because the people would have seen in it a desire on 



270 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

his part to become reconciled to the progressive spirit of the 
nineteenth century. It would have been accepted as a 
recognition of the fact — of which European society had then 
become conscious — that the wonderful advancement of the 
United States was attributable mainly to the separation of 
Church and State. But this was what Pius VII intended 
neither to concede nor recognize ; for it was plain to him 
that if Church and State were separated in Italy, the papacy 
would come to an end. Therefore, after reminding Napoleon 
that he considered his proposition as offensive to " the dig- 
nity of the Holy See," and an invasion of his "rights of 
free sovereignty," although it left all his spiritual powers not 
only unimpaired but fully protected, he emphatically and 
indignantly rejected it. After declaring that "it is not our 
will, it is that of God, whose place we occupy on earth," he 
proceeds to define the relations between the spiritual and the 
temporal powers in these unequivocal words : 

" We can not admit the following proposition : That we 
should have for your majesty in temporals the same regard 
that you have for us in spirituals. This proposition has an 
extent that destroys and alters the notions of our two 
powers. A Catholic sovereign is such only because he pro- 
fesses to recognize the definitions of the visible head of the 
Church, and regards him as the master of truth and tJie sole 
vicar of God on earth. There is therefore no identity or 
equality between the spiritual relations of a Catholic sov- 
ereign and the temporal relations of one sovereign to 
another." 4 

The true meaning of this was well understood at the time, 
and can not now be disguised by any method of interpreta- 
tion. According to Pius VII, therefore, a " Catholic sover- 
eign " must accept whatsoever the pope shall define in the 
domain of faith and morals, whether spiritual or temporal, 
because he alone is " the master of truth," and stands in the 
place of God on earth, and is, consequently, without any 



*De Montor, Vol. II, pp. 614 to 620. 



RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 271 

superior, or even equal ; that in no other way can a pope be 
such a supreme sovereign as he ought to be ; that it is his 
divine right to command, and the duty of temporal sover- 
eigns to obey ; and that, no matter what temporal relations 
shall exist among sovereigns, there can be no equality be- 
tween them and the pope, who shall rule them all, in what- 
soever concerns faith and morals, as *' the sole vicar of God 
on earth." If in this Pius VII is to be taken to have de- 
fined the only form of government which the papacy can 
recognize as rightful, then it is clear that none such now ex- 
ists in the world — not even in Italy since the abolition of the 
pope's temporal power. The European people at the time 
understood him sufficiently well to foresee that all their efforts 
to limit the monarchical power by constitutions would be un- 
availing if the papal policy announced by him should pre- 
vail. The Koman "Catholic populations, already upon the 
verge of revolution, were specially indignant when they real- 
ized that the papacy was thus availing itself of the author- 
ity of the Church, not only to defeat the popular will, but to 
require them to accept these teachings as essential parts of 
the faith. Hence, the revolutionary spirit was increased, so 
that by the time of the death of Pius VII, in 1823, it had 
become evident that it could not be arrested unless the 
papacy abated its pretensions and became reconciled to the 
existing condition of affairs. Pius VII fretted out his life 
because of the tendency of the times to liberalism ; and if it 
be said in his behalf that he lived at a stormy period, when 
the waves of the political sea ran high, it may well be re- 
plied that if he had possessed a conciliatory spirit he could 
have done more than any other living man to bring the dis- 
contented and jarring elements into harmony. But instead 
of this, he turned loose upon society the odious and con- 
demned Jesuits, whose very presence increased the pop- 
ular discontent, as the storm rages more violently when the 
imprisoned winds are unchained. 

Under the pontificate of Leo XII, the immediate succes- 
sor of Pius VII, the revolutionary fervor was increased. He 



272 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

found the Jesuits actively engaged in disturbing the peace 
among all who were reached by their influence, and lost no 
time in assuring them of his benediction in their efforts to 
exterminate everything thtt tended to liberalism and free, 
popular institutions. With the view of bringing Frauce 
completely under the papal scepter, he demanded that the 
clergy there should be made independent of the Government 
and irresponsible to its laws. But the public sentiment of 
France was so outraged by this demand that even Louis 
XVIII was constrained to condemn it by royal ordinance. 
Failing in this, he turned his attention elsewhere in Europe, 
adopting the Jesuit tactics of stirring up Protestant popula- 
tions against their kings, and Protestant kings against their 
subjects. In this way he, manifestly, hoped to allay, if not 
suppress, the revolutionary spirit, which was threatening to 
destroy his temporal power and deprive him of his crown. 
For a time he seemed to feel assurance of success in Ger- 
many and elsewhere, aud under the influence of this assur- 
ance visited his maledictions upon the modern philosophers, 
characterizing their opinions as "phalanxes of errors," and 
their toleration of different religious opinions as "indifference 
to all religion" — leading to infidelity. So as not to be misun- 
derstood, he represented them as " teaching that God has 
given entirely freedom to every man, so that each one can, 
without endangering his safety, embrace and adopt the sect or 
opinion which suits his private judgment." He makes this 
statement thus clear so that there may be no misconception 
of his unqualified condemnation of the freedom of religious 
belief, not only as it is taught by these modern philosophers, 
but as it constitutes the foundation of Protestantism and the 
civil institutions it has built up, especially those of the 
United States. Centering his wrath in a single anathema, 
he said: "This doctrine" — that is, the freedom of con- 
science — " though seducing and sensible in appearance, is 
profoundly absurd; and I can not warn you too much against 
the impiety of these maniacs." Then, passing to " the deluge 
of pernicious books " which inundated Europe, he specially 



RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 273 

selected the Holy Scriptures in the vernacular languages as 
prominent in this class. "A society," said he, ''commonly 
called the Bible Society, spreads itself audaciously over the 
whole world, and in contempt of the traditions of the holy 
fathers, in opposition to the celebrated decree of the Council 
of Trent, which prohibits the Holy Scriptures from beiug 
made common, it publishes translations of them in all the 
languages of the world. Several of our predecessors have 
made laws to turn aside this scourge ; and we also, in order to 
acquit ourselves of our pastoral duty, urge the shepherds to 
remove their flocks carefully from these mortal pastur- 
ages. . . . Let God arise ! Let him repress, confound, an- 
nihilate this unbridled license of speaking, writing, and pub- 
lishing." 5 

Charles X succeeded Louis XVIII as King of France, 
and the Jesuits, encouraged by the policy of Leo XII, re- 
newed their efforts in that country. They desired to get 
control of the young, as they have always done, and there- 
fore demanded that all public instruction in colleges and 
schools should be confided to them. If assent to this de- 
mand had depended upon the king alone, it would doubt- 
less have been obtained, because it was an essential part of 
the policy which brought about the alliance of the Bourbon 
and other sovereigns with the papacy. But the people of 
France knew the Jesuits too well to intrust their children to 
their care, and were so united in resisting this demand, that 
Charles X was compelled to refuse their request. And in 
order to rebuke the Jesuits as signally as possible, the public 
authorities provided by law that no one should be employed 
in teaching who belonged to any religious congregation — a 
fact which shows how far they felt justified in going in order 
to escape what they deemed a serious evil. This provision, 
however, for an exclusively secular education was made in 
full accordance with the Gallican Catholic and Protestant 
sentiment of France, and was intended, not as tending in 



5 Cormenin, Vol. II, pp. 426-427. 

18 



274 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the least degree to irreligion, but as a necessary step towards 
the complete separation of Church and State. 6 

Leo XII died pending these agitations. When his suc- 
cessor was elected — as near our own time as 1829 — and took 
the name of Pius VIII, the revolutionary embers needed 
only a little more stirring to break out into a flame. The 
success of constitutional government was becoming more and 
more apparent, and it was evident to the allied sovereigns 
that unless the current beating against them could be set 
back, they were in danger of being overwhelmed. As the 
idea of Church and State united was involved in the entire 
papal and royal policy, those, therefore, who were struggling 
after constitutional guarantees of the freedom of the press, 
of speech, and of religious belief, had no difficulty in under- 
standing that these great natural rights were specially an- 
athematized by the late Pope Leo XII, for the reason that 
they constituted the fundamental principles upon which that 
form of government must rest. Consequently, the masses of 
the people — Roman Catholics and Protestants alike — became 
more and more united and clamorous for these rights ; not 
only because they were in themselves of inestimable value, 
but because they had come to realize that the nations which 
maintained them were advancing in prosperity, happiness, 
and enlightenment, far more rapidly than those which sup- 
pressed and denied them. Pius VIII could not avoid realiz- 
ing all this, as well as the obligation resting upon the 
papacy, as the spiritual patron and guardian of monarchism, 
to arrest the popular tendency towards constitutional govern- 
ment. Accordingly, he had scarcely entered upon his pon- 
tificate when, w r edded to the policy of retrogression, like his 
immediate predecessors, Pius VII and Leo XII, he en- 
deavored to ingraft the teachings of the Jesuits more firmly 
than ever upon the doctrines of the Church. He addressed 
a circular letter to "the bishops of Christendom " — which, 
being to the whole Church and concerning the faith, was, 



« Corraenin, Vol. II, p. 428. 



RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 275 

necessarily, ex cathedra — wherein he pointed out some of the 
existing errors they were commanded to extirpate. This, 
according to the Jesuit teaching, was an act of infallibility, 
and required implicit obedience from all who were faithful 
to the papacy. It would have been well suited to the Middle 
Ages. After condemning "secret societies" — overlooking, 
of course, the Jesuits — and the '* fierce republicans," or sup- 
porters of popular government, as the " enemies of God and 
kings," he arraigned them for " breaking the bridle of the 
true faith and passive obedience to princes" and thus opening 
"the way to all crimes." He insisted that they were en- 
deavoring " to hurl religion and empires into an abyss." 
And when he reached the culminating point he expressed 
himself in these words : " We must, venerable brethren, 
pursue these dangerous sophists ; we must denounce their 
works to the tribunals ; we must hand over their persons to 
the Inquisitors, and recall them by tortures to the sentiments oj 
the true faith of the spouse of Christ."' 1 

These denunciations and threatenings were intended for 
those Roman Catholic populations who had always venerated 
the Church of Rome, in order to turn them away from their 
revolutionary course. But their increasing enlightenment 
enabled them to understand that they were papal interpola- 
tions upon the primitive faith. Not being disposed to make 
open tfar upon the pope, whose sacred office they revered, 
they attributed them to the undue influence of the Jesuits 
over him. This was especially the case in France, where, 
during the pontificate of Pius VIII, as we have seen, the 
efforts to bring the Government in subjection to the papacy 
were attributed to Jesuit intrigue. This gave the general 
sentiment throughout France a tendency towards liberalism, 
as was indicated, not only by frequent popular demonstra- 
tions during the reign of Charles X, but specially at the 
period here referred to by an election of the Chamber of 
Deputies. In July, 1830, an overwhelming majority of 



7 Cormenin, Vol. II, p. 429. 



276 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

liberal members were elected to the Chamber, which alarmed 
the monarchical and royal party, and increased the activity 
of the Jesuits. To counteract the influence of this election, an 
effort w T as made to turn the popular attention away from it by 
exciting the national pride in favor of royalty, in consequence 
of the successful termination of the war with Algiers. The 
royalists made this the cause of great rejoicing, and when 
they supposed that the people, impelled by their ideas of 
national glory, had become sufficiently enthusiastic, resolved 
upon a step designed to crush out the popular spirit of liber- 
alism. The king's minister, Polignac, the Archbishop of 
Paris, and the Jesuits, succeeded in inducing the king to 
defy public opinion by issuing a royal edict to prevent the 
assembling of the liberal Chamber of Deputies. This edict 
was composed of three ordinances : 1. Suspension of the 
liberty of the press; 2. Dissolution of the Chamber of Dep- 
uties before it met; 3. Changing the plan of elections by 
placing the returns in the hands of prefects in the pay of the 
Government. 8 By this high-handed and arbitrary act all 
Paris was thrown into commotion. Within the course of 
three days the spirit of revolution, which had been slumber- 
ing, but was not suppressed, became thoroughly aroused. 
The public indignation was exhibited among all classes of the 
population, except those enlisted in the cause of retrogres- 
sion. The people demanded the rights which had been se- 
cured to them by public charter. The deputies of the 
Chamber assembled. Barricades were thrown up in the 
streets. The popular revolt soon ripened into active revolu- 
tion, which terrified the king, who, unable to pacify the people, 
attempted, as a last resort, to do so by offering to rescind the 
tyrannical and obnoxious ordinances. But he was too late. 
The offense against popular rights was too flagrant to be 
so easily forgiven. The result was that Charles X — the last 
of the Bourbons — was ignominiously driven from the throne 
and from the country, and Louis Philippe, Duke of Orleans, 



8 History of France. By White. Page 540. 



RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 277 

made King of France. And thus did a Roman Catholic 
population fix the stamp of their reprobation upon the policy 
which the king, the papacy, and the Jesuits had designed 
for their enslavement. 

It was impossible any longer to disguise or to mistake 
the true character of the issue between progress and retro- 
gression — between constitutionalism and monarchism. It did 
not, therefore, take long for these events in France to im- 
part their influence to Roman Catholic populations elsewhere. 
Throughout the central parts of Europe the people were 
stirred up to inquiry, to protest, to revolution. Having by 
this time fully realized that the chief calamities which af- 
flicted them proceeded from the union of Church and State, 
and that a constitutional guarantee of protection was impos- 
sible so long as that union continued, their first efforts were 
directed to a separation of these powers, and the assignment 
to each its proper and independent sphere of duties. Many 
centuries of struggles had demonstrated that in no other way 
could political equality be obtained, or provision be made for 
assuring to them their natural and inalienable rights. The 
task was most difficult, because the papacy had been per- 
mitted to enlarge its powers by means of false decretals and 
constitutions, which the ambitious popes had employed with- 
out scruple, after they sundered their allegiance to the East- 
ern Empire and divided the Church. Nevertheless, they 
resolved upon the effort, hazardous as it was, rather than re- 
main longer in their humiliating condition of vassalage 
while the Protestant nations were moving forward in their 
careers of progress and improvement. A brief glance at the 
condition of Europe will show that they were favored by the 
times, as if Providence were then specially shaping the des- 
tiny of the world, so as to put a stop forever to the usur- 
pations by which the union of Church and State had been so 
long maintained, to the prejudice of the Church and the 
cause of Christianity, no less than to the natural rights of 
mankind. 

The Netherlands contained a population united only 



278 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

under a Government maintained by the combinations which 
had arisen out of the " Holy Alliance." In the north, Prot- 
estantism had the ascendency ; in the south, Roman Ca- 
tholicism prevailed. This latter part of the population, imi- 
tating their Christian brethren in France, desired separate 
independence, so that their civil institutions should be placed 
under their own control. They desired a constitution by 
which proper restraints could be placed upon the royal 
power, while, at the same time, they did not desire to de- 
stroy entirely the principle of monarchism ; but rather that 
it should continue to exist under proper limitations, so as to 
escape from the absolutism which had hitherto borne so 
heavily upon them. Being unable to accomplish their ob- 
ject in any other way, they inaugurated an insurrection in 
Brussels, which soon became a revolution, and resulted in a 
declaration of independence. The revolution soon acquired 
strength enough to establish the Government of Belgium, 
which then became separated from Holland. A king was 
chosen by an elected Congress, but the constitution tied his 
hands, and instead of being an absolute, he became a de- 
pendent monarch. In this there was no attempt to escape 
from the just and rightful influence of the Church, for which 
the population retained the attachment they had long felt. 
But it severed the bond of union between Church and State 
by placing in the hands of the people such portion of the 
powers of Government as they deemed it proper to assert, 
so that instead of submitting to the absolute domination of 
the papacy, they protected their own rights and interests by 
constitutional guarantees. It practically condemned the doc- 
trines of the Jesuits, which denounce revolution against abso- 
lute monarchism as sin, and laws proceeding from a tribunal 
of the people as heresy, and rightfully subject to resistance. 
France and Belgium having, therefore, both accepted 
revolution as a remedy for grievances which could no longer 
be endured, it excited no surprise when the same sentiment 
was imparted to other Roman Catholic populations of Europe. 
The masses were moved, almost everywhere, by the impulse 



RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 279 

to escape the influences of the old regime, and place themselves 
under institutions of their own creation, responsible only to 
themselves. The people of the different nations were beginning 
to understand and to sympathize with each other more than 
ever before. They were coming nearer together by means 
of the facilities of intercommunication, for which they were 
indebted to the spirit of Protestant progress. They were 
learning, from the marvelous successes of the advancing 
nations, that the real sources of national greatness were in 
their own hands, and depended for proper development upon 
themselves alone. In whatsoever direction they looked, 
they found evidences to assure them that these same suc- 
cesses could not be obtained without the constitutional guar- 
antee of the right of self-government. And having been 
brought to the conviction — no matter whether from choice or 
necessity — that they could more safely confide their temporal 
welfare to governments of their own construction than to 
either ecclesiastical . or secular monarchs who traced the pre- 
rogatives of absolute imperialism to the divine law, they 
accepted revolution as a just and rightful remedy for their 
wrongs. 

When France and Belgium had each broken the scepter 
of absolutism, their influence was soon imparted to the 
Roman Catholic populations in the south of Europe; and 
they, too, brooding also over their wrongs, began to gather 
up the weapons of revolution and prepare to use them. They 
moved slowly at first, because the chains which bound them 
were tightly riveted. But they kept their eyes steadily fixed 
upon the constitutional governments, and advanced cautiously 
towards a like fortune for themselves. They could not ex- 
pect to go at once to the whole extent of establishing popu- 
lar institutions, in the American sense. Their education and 
the forms of government to which they had been accus- 
tomed, had left them in a condition which made extreme 
caution indispensable, for fear that by rash and precipitate 
action the principles of the "Holy Alliance" might become 
so permanently established that Church and State could not 



280 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

be separated, and they would be compelled to acquiesce in 
the doctrine of the divine right of kings as an essential 
part of Christian faith, or make war upon the Church, which 
they had been taught to revere, and did, in fact, revere. 
The pope was the recognized spiritual head of the Church, 
and with that they were content. But he was also a tem- 
poral king in the States of the Church, and claimed that the 
authority pertaining to that position was divinely conferred, 
and included such spiritual sovereignty over the world as 
God himself possesses ; and that he was thereby made the 
infallible M master of truth," and was entitled to uninquiring 
and absolute obedience, not merely in spirituals, but in such 
temporal matters as he alone should declare to be essential to 
the preservation and exercise of his imperial prerogatives. 
They had endured the evils of that form of government long 
enough, and having contrasted their condition with that of 
peoples who had entered upon the experiment of governing 
themselves — such as those of the United States — they became 
convinced that they owed to themselves and their posterity 
the duty of undertaking the same experiment, even at the 
cost of revolution. All they could hope to do, under the 
conditions surrounding them, was to separate Church and 
State, disavow and discard the doctrine of the divine right 
of kings as temporal rulers, whether ecclesiastical Or secular, 
and substitute constitutional governments for absolute mon- 
archism; in other words, to try political institutions of their 
own creation in place of the "paternal government" by 
which the papacy had kept them from advancing along with 
the progressive peoples who had asserted and maintained the 
right of self-government. 

Had not these populations the right to do this? The 
American Declaration of Independence asserts that this right 
is derived from the law of nature, and is inalienable. The 
"Holy Alliance" of European sovereigns was organized to 
suppress it. The papacy and the Jesuits combined their ener- 
gies to resist it as heresy. There was, therefore, no middle 
ground between constitutional government and submission — 



RE-ENTERING SPAIN. 281 

between the continuance of the old order ot things and 
the infusion of new life into decrepit and decaying institu- 
tions. Consequently, the people of Southern Europe had to 
make choice between these alternatives, at the risk of being 
denounced and punished as unfaithful and heretical revolu- 
tionists. They patriotically chose the latter. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

REVOLUTIONS IN SOUTHERN EUROPE. 

The successor of Pius VIII was Gregory XVI, who be- 
came pope in 1831. His election was not calculated to 
pacify the people or lessen the general excitement. On the 
contrary, he fully committed his pontificate to the policy of 
retrogression, and this was so well understood that he had to 
prepare at once to grapple with the revolution, so near the 
Vatican that he could witness the surgings of the enraged 
populations. The Italian people assumed the attitude of de- 
fiance; and if they had been hitherto disposed to submit 
passively to the oppressions of the papacy, it then became 
evident that they, too, after centuries of obedience to the 
pope as an absolute temporal monarch, were resolved to try 
the experiment of self-government under a written constitu- 
tion. They had endured absolutism until they could do so 
no longer. 

The revolution broke out almost simultaneously at Bo- 
logna, Parma, and Modena, and very soon after at Rome. 
The pope was able to hold the insurgents in check in 
the latter city only by military force; but in the prov- 
inces the popular tumult increased. It is said, in behalf of 
Gregory XVI, that the insurrection was occasioned without 
any personal enmity to him; that "it arose against the rule, 
not against the ruler ; against the throne, not against its actual 
possessor. ... It aimed at the final overthrow of the 
reigning poiver, . . . the substitution of a republic for the 
existing and recognized rule. 1 " l Accepting this as true — and 
there is no reason for doubting it — it establishes the proposi- 



*De Montor, Vol. II, p. 780. 
282 



REVOLUTIONS IN SOUTHERN EUROPE. 283 

tion clearly that the Roman Catholic populations of the 
papal States entered upon the revolution for the purpose only 
of stripping the pope of his temporal power, leaving his 
spiritual power undisturbed. What followed is best inter- 
preted in the light of this acknowledged fact. 

A modern author thus depicts the condition of affairs 
from which the people of Italy revolted: "Absolutism, ad- 
ministered by priests, was the system which prevailed in the 
States of the Church during the pontificate of Gregory 
XVI, and in no part of the Peninsula, not even at Naples, 
were the people so oppressed or so ill governed." 2 

The same author further says: "In Sardinia, even more 
than in almost any other portion of the Peninsula, the 
Church enjoyed the exceptional privileges which she had 
acquired during the Middle Ages. The civil poiver had, in 
fact, no legal jurisdiction over the clergy. All offenses com- 
mitted by ecclesiastics were tried by clerical tribunals, acting 
upon the Canon law, and irresponsible to the State. More- 
over, these courts claimed, and to some extent exercised, 
jurisdiction over laymen accused of heresy, blasphemy, sac- 
rilege, and other offenses against the Church." 3 

As soon as the revolution was fairly inaugurated in all 
the cities of the legation, an insurrectionary army was 
marched towards Rome, avowing the purpose not to concede 
anything to the papacy, but to have the Government re- 
formed. The pope soon saw that he was powerless to resist 
so formidable a force, and that his crown would be lost to 
him unless he could obtain assistance from some of the 
allied sovereigns; that is, unless he could subdue his own 
Roman Catholic subjects by the help of a foreign army ! 
Notwithstanding he boastingly considered himself as armed 
with divine authority, he did not feel it safe, in the face of 
the stubborn facts before him, to rely alone upon assistance 
from that source. He had more confidence in military than 



2 Life of Victor Emmanuel. By Edward Dicey. Putnam's Sons, 
New York. Page 65. 3 Ibid., p. 132. 



284 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

in spiritual power, in dealing with a population he knew to be 
incensed with the outrages committed by the Government he 
was defending. He accordingly called upon Louis Philippe 
of France to send an army to Italy to punish his own 
Roman Catholic subjects, because they desired only to take 
the crown of temporal sovereignty from his head, leaving 
all his spiritual rights unassailed. He relied upon the pledge 
which the "Holy Alliance" had exacted from the sovereigns 
that they would intervene forcibly, when necessary, to protect 
monarchism wheresoever popular and constitutional govern- 
ment was set up against it, and, of course, in making this 
appeal to the King of France, must have supposed that he 
occupied firm ground. But France, by this time, had learned 
to look upon the doctrines of the "Holy Alliance" with dis- 
favor, and when she expelled Charles X, the last of her 
Bourbon kings, established the principle of non-intervention 
in the affairs of other Governments, and tied the hands of 
Louis Philippe so tightly that he was compelled to decline the 
request of the pope, and leave the revolution in Italy to take 
its course. De Montor says, what is true, that the revolu- 
tion in France had "encouraged the rebellion" in Italy* — 
which only proves that the Roman Catholics of Italy were 
apt imitators of their French brethren, dreading revolution 
as little, and as resolutely determined to avenge their own 
wrongs. Manifestly, they saw nothing in the faith of the 
primitive Church in support of the temporal power. 

Gregory XVI was undoubtedly discomfited by the refusal 
of Louis Philippe, which he had not probably anticipated ; and 
it left him but a single method of escaping the wrath of his 
own people — but one way of dispelling the clouds thickening 
about him and threatening a tempest. That was to cling to 
the doctrines of the "Holy Alliance," and solicit the military 
intervention of some power so wedded to absolute monarchy 
as to be willing to march its armies against any people who 
were patriotic enough to assail the doctrine of the divine 



<De Montor, Vol. II, p. 781. 



REVOL UTIONS IN SO TJTHERN EUROPE. 285 

right of kings in order to build up a government of their 
own. 

There was then but one sovereign in Europe who held 
himself in readiness to respond willingly to such a call as 
this — who kept a large standing army in preparation to over- 
run and desolate any country whose people were trying to 
establish their own national freedom. This single sovereign 
was the Emperor of Austria, at whose imperial court the 
Jesuits were always welcome and favored guests, and every 
pulsation of whose heart beat in unison with their doctrines. 
He readily accepted the invitation of the pope, and sent a 
large army to protect him and to desolate all Italy if his 
crown could not be saved in any other way. What a spec- 
tacle ! A great nation not assailed, not even offended, sending 
an immense army of conscripts — made mere machines by the 
relentless system of European military discipline — to hold in 
perpetual bondage populations whose only offense was the 
desire to establish their own constitutional government! 
The conflict was between the papacy and the Roman Cath- 
olic people of Italy — not between them and the Church. 
They had no fault to find with the Church, but desired only 
to separate the Church from the State by transferring the 
crown of temporal sovereignty to a king who would wear it 
under the restraints of a written constitution, and not leave 
it on the head of the pope, who claimed that it conferred 
absolute authority upon him by virtue of the divine law. 
They accepted in good faith all the teachings of the Church; 
but rejected the doctrine of the papacy and the Jesuits that 
it was a necessary part of the faith that the pope should be 
an absolute king over them and their children forever. 
And it was for this — nothing more — that Gregory XVI, 
near the middle of the nineteenth century, invoked the aid 
of a Roman Catholic army to make war upon Roman Cath- 
olic populations and punish them as heretics, by desolating 
their country, for desiring to be free ! 

Gregory XVI found none of that joy which a sense of 
security brings until the Austrians occupied Central Italy 



286 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

with their formidable army. Then he realized that he could 
keep his feet planted firmly upon the necks of the Italian 
people without fear and trembling, because he was backed 
by a power they were unable to resist. It was the first ray 
of light and hope that had shone upon bis pontificate ; and 
as the revolutionary insurgents seemed to melt away before 
this vast military host, he was encouraged to believe they 
were entirely suppressed. Then he doubtless iudulged in 
the exhilarating belief that his temporal crown would remain 
safe upon his head. It may well be imagined that the 
arches of the Vatican echoed and re-echoed with the strains 
of sacred music invoked to attest the pontifical rejoicing. 
But besides these scenes of joy, there were others existing in 
many of the provincial homes of Italy, where silence was 
broken by the sighs of multitudes of sincere Roman Cath- 
olic Christians, whose hearts were depressed with sadness at 
the thought that the pope, whose sacred office they vener- 
ated, had employed the spiritual power intrusted to him by 
the Church to perpetuate their civil bondage by means of 
an alien and merciless military force too powerful for suc- 
cessful resistance. 

Under these flattering circumstances Gregory XVI felt 
himself justified in announcing the principles of his pontifi- 
cal policy. This he did in an encyclical letter addressed to 
all the hierarchy throughout the world, who, when they read 
it, were required to believe that St. Peter was speaking 
through him. This celebrated document, issued at a date so 
recent that many now living may remember it, sets forth in 
plain and expressive terms the dogmas of faith upon which 
Gregory XVI rested his claim to temporal dominion. It 
was issued ex cathedra, and, being addressed to the whole 
Church, was intended as an infallible announcement of the 
true faith. It deserves, on that account, to be carefully 
scrutinized, whereby it may be plainly seen how far the 
papacy departs from the doctrines of the primitive Church 
in order to enable the pope to wear a temporal crown. It 
requires assent to a system of religious faith which no man, 



RE VOL UTIONS IN SO UTHERN EUROPE. 287 

living under the protection of free popular institutions, can 
entertain consistently with his obligation to maintain those 
institutions. 

He erects his system of faith upon this premise : That 
neither the pope nor the Church can be made "subject to 
the civil authority " of any country ; that is, that he may 
disobey all human laws which place any restraint upon his 
authority as he shall define it, at his own pleasure. Affirm- 
ing that all who do not assent to the faith as announced by 
the pope "will perish eternally without any doubt," he con- 
demned all other professions of religious faith as the "most 
fruitful cause" of evil. The diversity of religious profes- 
sions he considered the "poisoned source" of "that/aZse and 
absurd, or rather extravagant maxim, that liberty of conscience 
should be established and guaranteed to each man." He charac- 
terized this liberty of conscience as "a most contagious error, 
to which leads that absolute and unbridled liberty of opin- 
ion, which, for the ruin of Church and State, spreads over the 
world, and which some men, by unbridled impudence, fear 
not to represent as advantageous to the Church." Having 
thus denounced liberty of conscience as sinful, and its advo- 
cates as guilty of "unbridled impudence," he, as a necessary 
consequence, blended with it " the liberty of the press," which 
he called "the most fatal liberty, an execrable liberty, for which 
there never can be sufficient horror." These two great liberties, 
universally understood to constitute the basis of popular 
government, caused him, as he declared, " to shudder," be- 
cause he considered them "monstrous doctrines, or rather 
prodigies of error." He charged the people of Italy, who 
were demanding a constitution, "with the blackest machina" 
tions of revolt and sedition" in their "endeavor to destroy 
the fidelity due to princes, and to hurl them from their 
thrones." In the further inculcation of the duty " of constant 
submission to princes," he declared that this submission has its 
" source in the holiest precepts of the Christian religion ;" where- 
fore he insisted that "the Vaudois, Beguards, Wickliffites, 
and other like children of Belial, the shame and opprobrium 



288 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

of the human race," were "justly anathematized by the 
Apostolic See." And he condemned the separation of Church 
and State by characterizing it as "the rupture of concord 
between the priesthood and the empire," which he desired to 
preserve, because, said he, " it is an established fact that all 
the votaries of the most unbridled liberty fear more than all 
else this concord, which has always been so salutary and so 
happy for Church and State." 5 

Gregory XVI claimed infallibility ; that is, that he spoke 
by the inspiration and the authority of God, and therefore 
could not err, and, by virtue thereof, commanded absolute 
obedience to all these doctrines as necessary parts of the 
Christian faith, under the severest penalties for disobedience. 
Consequently, when the Roman Catholic populations of the 
Italian States, who had inaugurated the revolution, were in- 
formed of the doctrines thus announced by the pope, it was 
manifest to them that his purpose was to condemn as sinful 
and heretical everything they sought after. If they had 
doubted before, they were then forced to realize that if the 
revolution should be suppressed, and the absolute temporal 
authority of the pope be continued, the Church and the State 
would remain united ; the liberty of conscience, of speech, 
and of the press would be perpetually denied to them; the 
laws would be made at the pope's dictation, &nd not by 
themselves; the sovereigns of the "Holy Alliance" and the 
Jesuits would win a complete and, probably, a final triumph 
over liberalism; and that the Italian people would be re- 
quired, by compulsion if necessary, to assent to and maintain 
a form of religious faith which inculcated the doctrine that 
"constant submission to princes" was commanded by "the 
holiest precepts " of the Gospels. The pope had spoken 
plainly, and it was impossible not to understand how clearly 
and sharply he had made the issue between submission and 
revolution. What were they, under these circumstances, to 
do? They had already chosen revolution, — should they 



&De Montor, Vol. II, pp. 783 to 793. 



REVOLUTIONS IN SOUTHERN EUROPE. 289 

abandon it from fear of Austrian bayonets? The import and 
seriousness of this question are easily comprehended. It 
involved, if they should bring the revolution to a successful 
end, a constitutional form of government, or, by its abandon- 
ment, their own consent to the perpetuity of their civil bond- 
age. Independently of the fact that they considered a con- 
stitution worth struggling for, they had gone so far they 
could not retreat without abandoning a cause which might 
never be revived, if they should permit the pope, in return 
for Austria's help, to tighten the cords already binding them 
too tightly for longer endurance. Several provisional gov- 
ernments had been formed in the revolting States, and, al- 
though their functions were suspended, they were not aban- 
doned. In view, therefore, of the importance of the issue, 
and of all the consequences involved, both present and fu- 
ture, they courageously and patriotically determined that the 
conflict should be continued to the end. The revolutionary 
spirit had been too thoroughly aroused to be suppressed by 
the pope, with the Austrian armies at his back. He held it 
in check — nothing more. 

Events now moved slowly from necessity, requiring cir- 
cumspect and cautious management. The Provisional Gov- 
ernments were kept in abeyance at Bologna, Parma, Modena, 
and elsewhere, to await developments. A period of diffi- 
culty and doubt ensued, during which new combinations 
were formed — all, however, pointing to a constitution as the 
grand object to be achieved. The circle of revolutionary 
influences gradually enlarged, almost reaching the muzzles 
of the Austrian guns. The pope was forced to realize, evi- 
dently to his surprise, that the populations would not accept 
the doctrines of his encyclical as part of their religious faith, 
and that, if maintained at all, it could be done only by 
military force. He, therefore, induced the Austrian army to 
invade the States where provisional Governments had been 
formed. This was an actual military invasion of Italy by an 
alien army, in obedience to the requirements of the pope — 
an offense for which no apology has been or can be disco v- 

19 



290 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

ered. It was successful, of course, and a military garrison 
was established in Ferrara, whereupon Gregory XVI re-estab- 
lished his own arbitrary pontifical authority under Austrian 
protection. 

Papal edicts were accordingly issued, denouncing the 
revolution as irreligious and condemning the insurgents as 
heretics. The crisis grew more serious every day. Pacifi- 
cation seemed out of the question. Nothing but absolute 
and passive submission would satisfy the pope. The public 
mind was in a state of extreme agitation. Terror seized 
upon some, but the multitude remained courageously resolved 
not to stop short of a constitution. Old men found them- 
selves infused with new life, and vigorous and enthusiastic 
young men were stimulated by the idea of a new Italy — free, 
independent, and united. Under the watchword of "Young 
Italy " the revolutionists soon obtained footing in Lombardy, 
Genoa, Tuscany, and even in the States of the Church. 
Resolute and immediate action was demanded by those who 
were burning with fervid patriotism, but prudential consid- 
erations dictated extreme caution. The questions when and 
where to strike involved too much to be decided hastily. 
The presence of the Austrians alone prevented a popular 
uprising. They stood guard over the dispersed bands of 
Italian patriots, whilst Gregory XVI was allowed to gather 
materials for their annihilation. Such a scene has not often 
been witnessed, and men of all nations turned their eyes 
toward it with anxiety. Thoughtful and intelligent people 
everywhere — especially in the United States, among Roman 
Catholics as well as Protestants — sent words of encourage- 
ment and cheer to these patriotic and struggling masses, con- 
gratulating them upon having manfully resolved not to receive 
either their form of government or their religion from the 
points of Austrian bayonets. They were inspirited, not alone 
by general sympathy, but by the examples of their religious 
brethren in other parts of Europe. Besides the revolution 
in France and Belgium, which they had imitated from the 
beginning, the events transpiring in Portugal and Spain 



REVOL UTIONS IN SO UTHEBN EUROPE. 291 

proved to them that their cause would become hopeless only 
by ignominious surrender. 

In Portugal, revolution had ended in civil war and the 
complete subjugation of the retrogressive papal party, the 
suppression of the Jesuits, and the confiscation of their property. 
Gregory XVI, in the supposed plenitude of his spiritual 
power, had attempted to interfere, and threatened the authors 
of this revolution with excommunication and other forms of 
pontifical malediction. But his curses only intensified the 
determination to put an end to retrogression, so that Portugal 
could take her place among the progressive nations. In Spain 
events of the same character were also transpiring. The 
Jesuits were again suppressed, because they were the reputed 
authors of all public calamities, and even the nuncio of the 
pope was expelled from the country. Such examples as 
these, occurring among kindred populations of the same re- 
ligion, could not fail to incite fresh hopes in the minds of 
those Italians who were not becoming timid and in renewing 
the courage of those who were. Nevertheless, the presence 
of the Austrians compelled them still longer to await the 
coming of future events, some of which were then beginning 
"to cast their shadows before." 

We now reach a period when the scenes began to shift, 
and new actors appeared — of whom thousands yet living 
have formed favorable or unfavorable opinions, according 
to the standpoint from which they have considered them. 
Gregory XVI died iu 1846, leaving the revolution unsup- 
pressed — the storm still raging. He had been enabled, by 
the presence of the Austrian array, to prevent any formi- 
dable outbreak in the disaffected provinces, but could accom- 
plish nothing more than to leave to his successor, Pius IX, 
the inheritance of temporal power, not merely threatened, but 
seriously imperiled. The condition of things existing at the 
time of the latter's election can not be more aptly described 
than in the language of a distinguished author who has 
written the life of Pius IX. He says: 

"Gregory the Sixteenth was maintained on his throne, 



292 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

during his reign of fifteen years and a quarter, solely by the 
force of Austrian bayonets. The reports sent by the cardi- 
nals and prelates intrusted with the government of the 
various provinces to headquarters at Rome abundantly prove 
the truth of this assertion. To cite these here would occupy 
more space than could be allowed to the subject, and would 
but be a manifold reiteration of the statement, that the entire 
population was irreconcilably hostile to the Apostolic Government. 
The revolt had indeed been crushed by the enormously 
superior force of the Austrian troops. But disaffection was 
in no degree extinguished. Conspiracy was chronic in all 
the cities of the pontifical dominions. Discovery, repression, 
and punishment were the principal occupations of the papal 
Government and its agents during the whole of Gregory's 
reign, which may be said to have been one long struggle 
with conspiracy and revolution. The number of condemna- 
tions . . . are alone sufficient to show that the countries 
subjected to the government of the Apostolic Court were in 
a condition which could not have endured but for the over- 
powering pressure of an external force." 6 

Pius IX had a generous heart, was kindly disposed, and 
possessed many excellent personal qualities. After his election 
a general disposition was exhibited among all classes, except 
the extreme revolutionists, to await his course of action be- 
fore pronouncing judgment upon his pontificate. It was un- 
derstood that among the conclave of cardinals, assembled to 
elect a successor to Gregory XVI, he had united with sev- 
eral others in a petition which favored reforms and improve- 
ment in the papal Government. There were no strictly re- 
ligious questions to settle, as all were agreed with reference 
to these; and hence, as all the matters involved concerned 
temporal affairs alone, growing out of the revolution, a 
strong desire existed to give him the fullest opportunity to 
decide upon the means and measures of redress demanded by 
existing grievances. Even the extreme revolutionists were 



•Life of Pius IX. By Trollope. Vol. I, p. 



REVOLUTIONS IN SOUTHERN EUROPE. 293 

drawn to this policy by the general disposition to accept 
Pius IX as in some sense a reformer, and to give him full 
time to mature such measures of reform as he deemed ex- 
pedient. Considering the condition of things then existing, 
he came into power under circumstances which might easily 
have led to pacification, but for the adverse influences which 
he found himself, in the end, without the power, if he had 
the desire, to counteract. He should not be judged too 
harshly; for there are very few who have not, some time or 
other, been confronted by conditions which, instead of their 
being able to control, controlled them. The questions pend- 
ing were not such as the European sovereigns would allow 
to be considered Italian questions alone; if they had been, 
he might have found it in his power to gratify his natu- 
ral desire for peace and quiet throughout all the Italian 
provinces. But from the date of the "Holy Alliance" the 
supporters of monarchism had assumed that all such ques- 
tions possessed an international character, which entitled 
the sovereigns to interfere in the temporal and domestic 
affairs of any European State, so as to suppress by military 
force any popular effort to establish constitutional govern- 
ments. Gregory XVI, besides his general acquiescence, had 
given his express pontifical sanction to this principle ; first, 
by invoking the aid of the King of France, and then by in- 
viting the Austrian army to Italy; and whatsoever may 
have been the inclination of Pius IX, he had to encounter, 
at the beginning of his pontificate, difficulties of no ordinary 
magnitude. 

Even the Conclave of Cardinals which elected him con- 
tained two parties — the Absolutists and the Liberals. The 
lines separating them were distinctly marked, and each 
party had its candidate. The Absolutists, wedded to the 
retrogressive policy of Gregory XVI, favored Cardinal Lam- 
bruschini, because as Secretary of State under Gregory, he 
was strongly in favor of, and had given direction to, that 
policy. The diplomatic representatives of all the Govern- 
ments, except France, took the same side, because it prom- 



294 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

ised pontifical aid to monarchism and opposition to liberal- 
ism and progress. Pius IX, as Cardinal Mastai, has never 
been charged with having endeavored to promote his own 
election, but having been supported by the Liberal cardi- 
nals and the French ambassador, he acquired the reputa- 
tion of favoring reform in the existing order of affairs, and 
doubtless deserved it. His election, consequently, was con- 
sidered a triumph of Liberalism over Absolutism. 

By that time the policy of Gregory XVI had " studded 
the country with gibbets, crowded the galleys with prisoners, 
and filled Europe with exiles, and almost every other 
home in the papal States with mourning." 7 Among the 
"middle classes" there were few families not grieving at 
the absence of some of their members, either imprisoned or 
sent into exile, only for desiring reform in the civil govern- 
ment. It is fair to suppose that Pius IX, influenced by a 
kindly nature, sympathized with all these. Whether he did 
or not, however, he entered upon the second month of his 
pontificate by issuing a decree of amnesty which opened the 
prison doors, and btought back the exiles upon whom the 
heavy hand of his immediate predecessor had fallen. This 
was an amnesty for political offenses, and, viewed in that 
light, is entitled to be regarded as an act creditable to its 
author. In order to decide, however, what was its precise 
character and effect, and how subsequent events were molded 
by it, its terms and conditions must be observed. Its gen- 
eral purport was sufficiently comprehensive to embrace all 
classes of political prisoners and offenders, except ecclesias- 
tics ; but it required that, in consideration of the clemency 
granted them, they should " make in writing a solemn dec- 
laration, on their honor, that they will not in any manner or 
at any time abuse this grace, and will for the future fulfill 
the duties of good and faithful subjects." A written dec- 
laration was required, which was intended to be explanatory, 
but was somewhat broader in its terms. It required that 



i Life of Pius IX. By Trollope. Vol. I, p. 108. 



REVOLUTIONS IN SOUTHERN EUROPE. 295 

Pius IX should be recognized as the " lawful sovereign," aud 
that the disturbances made by the revolution should be con- 
demned for having " attacked the lawfully-constituted authority 
in his temporal dominions." 8 

This meant, of course, the recognition of the old order of 
things, except in so far as Pius IX, whose temporal author- 
ity as king was preserved, should think proper of his own 
accord to introduce reforms. It was not understood to mean 
a continuance of the entire retrogressive policy of Gregory 
XVI, because, underlying the fact of amnesty, the person- 
ality of Pius IX and his supposed tendency to liberalism 
had to be considered in interpreting it. That being the 
view taken of it, and this latter consideration having fur- 
nished the ground of hope in the future, the amnesty was 
generally accepted, and shoutings, rejoicings, and Te Deums 
were heard in all directions, in the provinces as well as at 
Rome. The only visible exception among the Italians were 
the extreme revolutionists, who would be reconciled to noth- 
ing but the absolute destruction of the temporal power of 
the pope, by the separation of Church and State and the 
formation of a constitutional government. They were not 
sufficiently numerous, however, to give direction to the gen- 
eral sentiment, and matters progressed with a seeming qui- 
etude which had not existed for a long time. They bore the 
appearance of there having been a reconciliation between the 
pope and the great body of the Italian people. This, how- 
ever, soon proved to be merely in appearance. It only 
lulled the storm, and put the winds at rest for a time. The 
amnesty left the temporal power of the pope existing; and, 
although apparently acquiesced in by many who desired a con- 
stitution, it is manifest that they were persuaded to this by the 
belief, founded upon the liberal tendency of the pope's mind, 
that he would introduce such reforms as would remove the 
existing abuses in the civil Government. With these abuses 



8 Life of Pius IX. By Maguire. Page 22, and note *. Trollope, 
Vol. I, p. 135. 



296 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

removed, they possibly hoped to become reconciled to the 
temporal power, at least during the life of Pius IX. The 
acceptance of the amnesty, therefore, should be considered as 
the result of personal trust in him — of the hope, if not the 
conviction, that he would introduce such reforms as were re- 
quired by the public welfare. The popularity of Pius IX 
was somewhat phenomenal, owing probably to the fact that 
he had been elected and was accepted as a Liberal, and be- 
cause, moreover, he contrasted most favorably with the 
harsh, cruel, and despotic Gregory XVI. The people evi- 
dently considered a good king — as they expected Pius IX 
to be — preferable to war, bloodshed, and desolation. It was 
a choice of evils. 

Pius IX, although thus recognized as absolute sovereign 
in Italy, was not the arbiter of his own fortunes. It was 
an omen of evil for both Christianity and the Church when 
the ambition of the popes led them to unite with political 
sovereigns and make common cause with them in support of 
absolute monarchism. The combination necessary to their 
success became unavoidably such as to require of the pope, 
not merely the recognition of the avowed policy of the sov- 
ereigns — which was purely temporal — but that this policy 
should be ingrafted upon the faith of the Church, and 
obedience to it be exacted by compulsion when not yielded 
willingly. This was the avowed object of the "Holy Alli- 
ance," as understood and explained by Metternich, its great 
leader and dictator; and when Gregory XVI found it im- 
possible to maintain his temporal power without the military 
aid of Austria, he committed his pontificate, and endeavored 
to commit the Church, by making the temporal policy of the 
sovereigns part of its faith. Pius IX was compelled to ac- 
cept the pontificate in the face of these existing facts, and 
had consequently to contend with two opposing forces ; that 
is, the revolutionary element at home, and the sovereigns 
throughout Europe who demanded that he should continue 
the retrogressive policy of Gregory XVI. It is, therefore, 
but simple iustice to his memory to say that while his 



REVOL UTIONS IN SO UTHERN EUROPE. 297 

liberalism made him popular with the masses, he was so 
hampered, restrained, and tied down by the relations between 
Gregory XVI and Austria — representing the ' ' Holy Alli- 
ance" — that much of what he afterwards did might possibly 
have been avoided if he had been permitted to have his 
own way. 

Those who see nothing to disapprove in all the conduct 
of Pius IX, speak of his course at the beginning of his pon- 
tificate as "noble." He was, in some sense, entitled to this 
praise in so far as he professed a desire for reform, although 
his reformatory measures were not such as reached the root 
of the existing evils. But the fact that he was accepted as 
a reformer in any sense by the people, was in itself the 
cause of serious embarrassment to him — proving how difficult 
it was to escape the scorching fires which surrounded him. 
His tendency to reform excited the "alarm" of Austria, 
whose emperor saw in it a possible departure from the retro- 
gressive policy of Gregory XVI and the "Holy Alliance." 
Maguire — an earnest defender of the pope — says that this 
alarm of Austria was occasioned by the knowledge that " the 
spirit emanating from the Vatican was kindling a new and 
dangerous fire in the breast of a downtrodden people;" 9 
that is, was kindling afresh the fires of revolution. The 
plain and obvious meaning of this friendly explanation is 
that the people of Italy had been, and still were, oppressed 
by the policy of the papacy, enforced, as it then was, by the 
arms of Austria, and that Austria considered that of Pius IX 
threatening to the cause of monarchism, because it tended to 
remove this oppression and excite in the minds of the people 
an increased desire for constitutional government. He gives 
as the reason for this the fact that Austria was "the most 
formidable enemy of reforms, which she had every reason to 
dread." Why? Manifestly because reform indicated the pos- 
sible loss of the temporal power by the pope, which would 
inevitably prove a serious blow to monarchical power, and 



a Maguire, p. 28. 



298 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the possible establishment of popular institutions in Italy. 
He also says that Naples " viewed with jealousy" the conduct 
of the pope ; and that some smaller monarchical powers also 
regarded it "with dismay;" and, in addition, that "many 
of the cardinals" participated in this alarm of the sover- 
eigns. 10 Lambruschini, whose election was defeated by the 
choice of Pius IX, was undoubtedly at the head of this fac- 
tion of cardinals, all of whom, says Trollope, were the 
"bitter, rancorous, and irreconcilable enemies of everything 
that changed, or showed a tendency to change, anything that 
had existed under the late pope." 11 

Pius IX was severely tried, and it is not to his discredit 
that he was perplexed. He stood between two imminent 
and threatening dangers — with Austria supported by other 
sovereign powers, a faction of retrogressive cardinals, and 
the Jesuits, upon one side, and the revolutionists upon the 
other. The circumstances would have put to a severe test 
the courage and firmness of a more experienced statesman. 
In the face of these surroundings he entered upon a series of 
reforms, the necessity for which proves how extensive and 
oppressive had been the misgovern ment of his predecessor, 
and how little liberty the people were permitted to enjoy 
under him. These had reference to measures of administra- 
tion, and were desigued lo improve the public service in the 
hospitals, prisons, and religious institutions. Provision was 
made for the punishment of fraud and extortion. Useful 
works were encouraged and industry stimulated. Some op- 
pressive taxes were remitted. Companies were authorized to 
build railroads and to introduce gas. Laymen were allowed 
to hold some inferior offices. Partial freedom of the press 
was provided for; but it was only partial, inasmuch as papal 
censorship was preserved. Infant, Sunday, and evening 
schools were established. And in a public circular he an- 
nounced that he proposed to assemble a Board of Councilors 
to advise with in reference to the administration of public 



1 Maguire., p. 29. " Trollope, Vol. I, pp. 146-147. 



KEVOL UTIONS IN SO UTBERN EUROPE. 299 

affairs. The names of these were to be proposed by the 
governors of the provinces, and he was to select the Board 
from the number proposed. 12 

If all these reforms were necessary — and that they must 
have been is indicated by the fact that they«ttere granted — 
public affairs were undoubtedly in a most deplorable con- 
dition during the pontificate of Gregory XVI. But whether 
they were or not, a glance at them will show that none of 
them reached the questions which brought on the revolution. 
They were, in an essential degree, necessary measures of do- 
mestic policy, and whatsoever valuable results may have been 
produced by them, they still left the entire temporal power 
in the hands of the pope, so that the people would in the 
future have nothing to do with making the laws, but would 
be bound to obey such as the pope alone should dictate. 
And in order to make any advance towards constitutional 
government impossible, the proposed Board of Councilors 
were to be practically selected by the pope. This Board was 
considered by the papal party as a great concession to the 
people, but it was only relatively so ; that is, it was one step 
in advance of the old system previously existing. The pub- 
lic were disposed to accept it from the pope, if not the belief 
that it would produce beneficial results; and consequently 
its first meeting was hailed with anxiety. Its probable action 
was discussed with more freedom than Rome had been ac- 
customed to, as even the limited freedom of the press had 
caused a considerable increase in the number of newspapers, 
and a corresponding desire to discuss public questions. The 
inevitable effect of such a discussion was to invite public at- 
tention to the fact, which soon became apparent, that, instead 
of the Board of Councilors being such a reform as the people 
had hoped for and expected, its actual meaning was to per- 
petuate the temporal power of the pope, and to prevent, so 
long as that existed, the possibility of constitutional gov- 
ernment. Whilst matters were in this unsettled condition, 



12 Maguire, pp. 28-29. Trollope, Vol. I, p. 167. 



300 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

Pius IX — unfortunately for himself — was prompted, either 
at his own or the suggestion of others, to remove all doubt 
from the subject by informing the Board of Councilors, in a 
speech, that he had "not the slightest intention of lessening the 
power of the pontifical sovereignty," and that the Councilors had 
nothing to do "beyond giving an opinion when asked to do so." 
At a subsequent time, in a proclamation issued by his car- 
dinal secretary of state, he announced that the only progress 
he proposed to authorize was "within those limits determined 
by the conditions essential to the sovereignty and the temporal 
government of tlie head of the Church." 13 

The old issue was thus revived by the pope himself, in 
such form and with so much directness that everybody un- 
derstood it. Discussious of it immediately became common 
in the public assemblages of Rome. If the extreme revolu- 
tionists were able to excite the people by their eloquent and 
stirring appeals, it was unquestionably owing to the unwise 
and iujudicious avowal of his purposes by the pope. If he 
had permitted his administrative reforms to work out their 
legitimate results, they might have strengthened his cause 
and that of the papacy. But he failed to do this, and 
thereby increased, rather than diminished, his own embarrass- 
ment. He soon realized the necessity of adopting precau- 
tionary measures to suppress a popular tumult in the event 
that the people could be held in check in no other way. 
For this purpose he created a "civic guard," which was un- 
derstood to mean, and in fact was, a military force, to be 
moved against the people whensoever he deemed it expe- 
dient. It was in reality a papal army, u to consist of every 
male inhabitant throughout the States of the Church, be- 
tween twenty-one and sixty, who possessed property, or kept 
a shop, or was at the head of an industrial establishment." 14 
This measure could not be viewed in any other light than as 
immediate preparation for an aggressive military movement 
against all who did not submit to the papal policy — in other 



13 Trollope, Vol, I, pp. 173 and 194. " Ibid., p. 197. 



REVOL UTIONS IN SO UTHERN EUROPE. 301 

words, as a contemplated act of war. Looking at it as such, 
the pope's cardinal secretary of state, who did not favor it, 
resigned his office, withdrew from the papal service, and left 
the pope to the counsel of others. This conspicuous seces- 
sion from his cause necessarily produced the most serious re- 
sults, and was mainly influential in exciting all the discon- 
tented. Those who had been induced to acquiesce in the 
measures of the pope, with the hope that they would lead to 
pacification, were then brought to realize that there was no 
longer any real ground for this hope. On the other hand, 
they could see nothing in them but what indicated the pur- 
pose of the pope to maintain his temporal power by means 
of civil war, if he should find that necessary. The issue, 
consequently, became too distinct and direct to be longer 
evaded or misunderstood ; and from that time the unification 
of Italy and the abolition of the temporal power became the 
watchwords of all who desired a constitution, as they soon 
after became also their battle-cry. At a public assemblage 
to celebrate the birthday of Pius IX, processions of people, 
marching through the streets of Rome, prepared tablets with 
these mottoes, among others, upon them : " Liberty of the 
press!" " Banishment of the Jesuits!" "Abolition of arbi- 
trary action on the part of the police!" " Codes of useful 
and impartial laws !" " Publication of the acts of the Con- 
sulta !" "Faith in the people I" As a shower of rain pre- 
vented the public exhibition of these tablets, they were sent 
to the cardinal secretary of state, so that the pope should 
be enabled to interpret the mottoes upon them and under- 
stand their meaning and significance. In every direction 
the signs of popular discontent increased. 

It has been said of Pius IX that he was " vainglorious," 
which is unquestionably true. This quality is not incon- 
sistent with integrity of purpose, but often unfits its pos- 
sessor for efficacious action in a great crisis. It causes one to 
rely too much upon personal influence and popularity, as 
was the case with him. When he met assemblages of the 
people, he addressed and bestowed benedictions upon them 



302 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

with apparent self-satisfaction, supposing that their shouts 
were intended to express unbounded veneration for him, 
whereas they were the result of respect for his sacred office, 
which restrained many who desired to see the temporal power 
abolished from openly and publicly avowing it. Those who 
appealed to and played upon his vanity misled him. Who 
these were it is not difficult to tell. They were the allied 
sovereigns, who, in obedience to the policy of the " Holy 
Alliance," had dictated the measures of Gregory XVI, and 
maintained them by the arms of Austria, the retrogressive 
cardinals, and the Jesuits — the latter, as always, thrusting 
themselves forward, ready to strike, whensoever a blow was 
needed, at the cause of constitutional government. This 
powerful combination was enabled to dictate to the kind- 
hearted pope, by appeals so artfully made that he became as 
pliable as wax in their hands. Under their controlling in- 
fluence he composed his Council of Ministers to aid in ad- 
ministering public affairs, exclusively of ecclesiastics ; thereby 
teaching the people that they could have no part whatsoever 
in those matters which immediately concerned their temporal 
welfare. To such an extent was this method of procedure 
carried that it soon became evident that Italy was, in fact, 
governed by foreign and alien influences, to which the pope 
had allowed himself to become entirely subjected. As Aus- 
tria stood at the head of these influences, the Italian people 
regarded her with both suspicion and dread. And when the 
Austrian army was moved into Modena, thereby inducing 
the belief that the military occupation of the States of the 
Church was intended, the popular indignation became so 
great that the people demanded of Pius IX that he should 
declare war against Austria, notwithstanding her immense 
military strength. The circle of influences surrounding him 
was now growing more and more complicated, evidently add- 
ing to his embarrassment. He knew that he was under the 
suspicion of Austria because of his former tendency towards 
liberalism at the beginning of his pontificate, but could not 
venture to break his alliance with her, being assured, if he 



REVOL UTIONS IN SO VTEERN EUROPE. 303 

did, that it would lead to movements elsewhere in the Italian 
States that would shake the papacy to its center, and inevi- 
tably cost him the loss of his temporal power, which he 
dreaded more than all else. 

These complications created others, which added to the 
uncertainties of the future. Under the existing emergencies 
a skillful statesman would have found a broad field for 
the display of ability in escaping the pitfalls before him. 
But Pius IX was not a statesman in any sense, and knew 
but little of public affairs as they existed in the Italian 
provinces, except what centered in the papacy, and nothing 
of international relations, except that as pope he was tied to 
the car of the reigning sovereigns, and was compelled, nolens 
volens, to share their fortunes. If he had possessed broad 
and comprehensive views — sufficient to have enabled him to 
see beyond the narrow circle in which he was moving — he 
might have realized that, whilst the people of Italy were 
willing and anxious to award him full credit for such re- 
forms as he had introduced, they fell far short of the popu- 
lar desire, because they did not reach the evils complained 
of, which had existed so long as to have become festering 
sores. He might also have seen that it was not a mere fitful 
fever of excitement which led to the demand for the expul- 
sion of the Austrians, but the fixed and resolute purpose of 
an incensed population that they would no longer submit to 
the degradation of being held in subjugation by foreign bay- 
onets. A skillful pilot would have pointed out to him the 
method of avoiding shipwreck ; but he could find no such 
pilot among the ecclesiastics who were trained in the same 
school as himself, and he would have no other. To them he 
submitted everything, as his only advisers ; and yet, at the 
same time, he seemed to suppose that, in his own personal- 
ity, he possessed the power to suppress the most violent pop- 
ular tumult. He frequently addressed assembled multitudes 
in Rome, and never failed to elicit " evvivas" and other 
tokens of personal respect, but neglected to observe the sig- 
nificant fact that, underlying all these, the sentiment most 



304 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

deeply imbedded in the popular mind was expressed by such 
cries as these: "Viva Pio Nono, solo!" "Hurrah for Pio 
Nono, without his advisers!" " Hurrah for Italian independ- 
ence !" and others of like meaning. At one time he quieted 
the people by assuring them that he was on good terms with 
the King of Sardinia aud the Grand Duke of Tuscany, and 
that he would soon replace his ecclesiastical advisers by lay- 
men. At another time he endeavored to impress their minds 
with the idea that the security of the papacy was not seri- 
ously threatened, because there were " two hundred millions 
of brothers of all languages and all nations " upon whose assistance 
he could safely rely ! What degree of sincerity accompa- 
nied this avowal, it is not necessary to inquire. It would 
seem, however, to have been suggested by a heated imagi- 
nation as the best means of rounding off an eloquent period, 
for which Pius IX acquired deserved celebrity. One would 
scarcely think that a statesman with a practical mind could 
have expected to satisfy the supporters of his policy that all 
the Roman Catholics in the world would come to their de- 
fense against the patriotic Italians who were demanding to 
be relieved from foreign aggression, and the abolition of the 
temporal power, with a view to their own national independ- 
ence. Nor is it probable that any other man but Pius IX 
would have risked such an avowal in the face of the facts 
that the Roman Catholic populations of the three great na- 
tions, France, Spain, and Portugal, and other smaller States, 
had secured their own independence by the very methods he 
was condemning. Preposterous as the suggestion was, it may 
have quieted the apprehensions of some whose unenlightened 
minds and passive indifference to results were the fruits of 
the retrogressive policy of the papacy. But there were nu- 
merous others whose intelligence enabled them to see through 
the thin disguise and gauzy eloquence of the pope, and to 
comprehend the leading thought which burdened his mind. 
And especially may it be supposed that this result was pro- 
duced when Pius IX immediately followed his boastful prom- 
ise of assistance from the whole " two hundred millions" of 



REVOL UTIONS IN SO UTHERN E UR OPE. 305 

Roman Catholics throughout the world, by saying that Rome 
was safe " as long as this Apostolic See shall remain in the midst 
of her I" 15 Thoughtful people, understanding when he spoke 
of the Apostolic See in this connection that he meant only 
the temporal power and kingship of the pope, rightfully in- 
terpreted this declaration as opposed to Italian independence 
and as a denial of their right to a constitutional form of gov- 
ernment. And such, in fact, it was, as became more appar- 
ent every day. Even the most illiterate soon came to com- 
prehend it, and to understand the actual condition of affairs. 
At an immense assemblage in the Quirinal a few days after, 
the people again shouted " evviva" for Pius IX, and imme- 
diately after cried out, " Italy, freed from the Austrians /" 
" A Constitution !" "Down with the priests !" Being stirred 
by these popular shouts, and being doubtless led to believe 
that his personal popularity was unbounded, he exclaimed, 
with the utmost energy and emphasis : " Be faithful to the 
pontiff. Do not ask what is contrary to the Church and to 
religion ! Certain voices, and certain cries reach my ears, 
proceeding not from the many, but from the few, which I 
neither will nor can admit !" 16 

Events which might have moved somewhat tardily before, 
were, after this explicit declaration of the pope in favor of 
the Austrians and against a constitution, hastened into great 
activity. Everything demonstrated that the people were act- 
ing under the influence of a settled conviction that all their 
best and dearest interests required that they should establish 
an independent constitutional government at whatsoever 
cost. And the resoluteness with which the purpose to ac- 
complish this end was formed and maintained by the Italian 
people will fully appear in the sequel of their history, which 
furnishes a conspicuous instance of the manner in which the 
example of the people of the United States reacted upon the 
modern populations of the European States. 



is TroUope, Vol. I, pp. 216-218. 16 Ibid., p. 220. 

20 



CHAPTER XVII. 

TEMPORAL POWER OF THE POPE OVERTHROWN. 

When Pius IX suffered himself to be betrayed into the 
emotional remark quoted in the last chapter — that he neither 
could nor would admit such modifications of the laws as the 
people desired — he made a fatal mistake. It placed him in 
direct opposition to the expulsion of the Austrians, the cre- 
ation of a constitutional government, and an independent 
Italian nation. He must have been grossly deceived by his 
ecclesiastical advisers if he did not know that the popu- 
lar mind had become intensely aroused by the desire to see 
all these things accomplished, that the revolution had no other 
meaning, and that everything transpiring indicated unmistak- 
ably that pacification was impossible without them. He would 
have known, upon a little reflection, that the true Christian 
faith of the Church, as taught by the apostles and " the fath- 
ers," was, in no proper sense, involved in any of these proposi- 
tions ; that they had the approval of millions of Roman Cath- 
olics throughout the world, and a vast majority of the Ital- 
ians, and that by employing his pontifical authority to ingraft 
upon the faith the odious Jesuit doctrine that it was heresy 
to deny the temporal power and kingship of the pope, he 
was not only doing violence to the honest convictions of 
these multitudes of Christians, but was endeavoring to con- 
vert the Church, as the representative of the whole body of 
its members, into a machine for the perpetuation of mon- 
archism, and the suppression of the right of popular self- 
government. 

To say to the people of Italy, as he did, that a constitutional 
government established by them would violate the divine 
law, in the face of what such governments had done elsewhere 
306 



TEMPORAL POWER OVERTHROWN. 307 

in the world — especially in the United States — was, besides 
being an act of weakness on his part, an arraignment of the 
popular intelligence of the world. Such a doctrine was only- 
endured in the Middle Ages because the multitude were 
trained to servility and obedience, and held in that condition 
by the united authority of Church and State. But its avowal 
at the middle of the nineteenth century could be understood 
in no other sense, even at Rome, than the expression of a de- 
sire to see the period of human progress brought to an end 
by the permanent triumph of imperial power. It was the 
mapping out for the modern progressive nations such a policy 
as would, by destroying their constitutions, subject them to 
papal domination throughout the vast domain of faith and 
morals ; for if, as he declared, the two hundred millions of 
Romau Catholics scattered through the world were to be- 
come subject to his summons to defend the temporal power 
of the pope, they would thereby become the creatures of his 
will and the passive instruments of his power. There were 
very few so ignorant as to be misled by his appeals for the 
continuance of his own monarchical and absolute power, and 
therefore his attempt, by the aid of the Austrians, to put 
stronger rivets in their chains, only made them the more 
resolute in the determination to break their fetters entirely. 
As each day passed, the people became better acquainted 
with the opinions and purposes of Pius IX. Yet, with com- 
mendable patience, they submitted to his repeated censures, 
on account of their real love for him, no less than their ven- 
eration for his office. If he could have comprehended them 
fully, mingled emotions would have been excited in his 
mind — those which spring up when the cords that reach the 
sympathies of the heart are touched, and such as pride, 
vanity, and ambition invariably engender. But, apart from 
the emotions he may have personally experienced, he was 
controlled by circumstances against which he was powerless 
to contend, because the existing complications had been 
produced before his time, by combinations which recognized 
no sympathy for popular suffering, and had become strong 



308 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

enough to master even the papacy itself. Possibly his nat- 
ural tendencies may have inclined him to break the bonds 
which held him in the grasp of the monarchs and the Jes- 
uits; but he was as unable to do this as a child is to tear 
away from the arms of a strong man. He was, in fact, 
scarcely himself, but the victim of others far less scrupulous, 
who lulled or aroused his passions and vanity at their pleas- 
ure, no matter what fate befell him, the Church, or the peo- 
ple of Italy. If he looked beyond Italy, he found the great 
military and monarchical power of Austria holding him by 
the throat, and tightening its grasp every day. If he looked 
at Rome, where he ought to have had wise counsels, he saw 
himself surrounded by a corps of ecclesiastics whose minds — 
howsoever otherwise enlightened — were dwarfed from the 
want of practical knowledge of the world and practical 
experience in the management of affairs, and who saw in 
human progress only that which placed a curb upon their 
own ambition and a limit to ecclesiastical authority. But 
in whatsoever direction he turned his eyes, he was haunted 
by the specter of Loyola, which flitted through the recesses 
of the Vatican at all times, ready " to whet his almost 
blunted purpose" whensoever he became wavering and irres- 
olute. The popular cry of "constitution" sounded like a 
death-knell to all these advisers, with whom a war with Aus- 
tria and an independent Itlay were sacrilegious violations of 
the divine law. We should not, therefore, censure Pius IX 
too severely when we find him surrounded and hedged in 
by such influences as these, which few men would have 
strength enough to resist. No matter what glories clustered 
about his sacred office, he was human like other men. 

War with Austria soon became the popular cry; and 
when the people of the provinces were apprised that the 
pope did not favor it, they began at once to look in another 
direction for assistance. The relations between Austria and 
Sardinia had long been hostile, and it was natural that they 
should look to an alliance with Piedmont, then armed, for 
the protection the pope refused. When Pius IX became 



TEMPORAL POWER OVERTHROWN. 309 

sufficiently composed to anticipate even the possibility of such 
a step as this, he, probably for the first time, was made to 
realize how rapidly dangers were gathering and thickening 
around the papacy, and how incompetent he would be to 
encounter them, if the popular vengeance, aroused by his in- 
difference and neglect, should be turned against him. He 
was, accordingly, induced to yield again to the better im- 
pulses of his nature, and attempted to turn away the public 
wrath by additional measures of reform. There were some 
political prisoners who had not been included in his amnesty, 
and these were pardoned. He also had the walls pulled 
down which separated the Jews from the other parts of the 
population. But these measures, although important, were 
of slight consequence so long as the Jesuits were permitted 
to remain in Rome. Their society, was regarded as a canker- 
ous sore eating at the heart of society, with an appetite too 
voracious to be appeased. They had been driven from every 
city in the provinces, and were followed by a degree of pop- 
ular odium which would have dispirited any other body of 
men. But so far from that effect having been produced 
upon them, their knowledge of the disrepute in which they 
were held had the effect only to intensify their hatred of 
everything that tended to aid the cause of the people in their 
efforts to secure a constitution. Having found shelter in 
Rome, they crowded around the pope, practicing all their arts 
in playing upon his vanity, inciting his passions, and turning 
him against the people. At last the measure of popular 
odium which rested upon them became so great that Pius 
IX was awakened to a consciousness of their dangerous 
presence, and he drove (hem out of Italy. It required some 
courage to do this, but it would have required infinitely more 
not to do it, inasmuch as the detestation in which they were 
held was well-nigh universal among the people, large numbers 
of whom were disposed to attribute to their influence alone 
much of what was done by the pope. Their expulsion, under 
the circumstances, was, therefore, creditable to Pius IX, not 
alone because it was done in deference to public opinion, but 



310 FOOTPRINTS Sf THE JESUITS. 

because it indicated that he had become apprised of their evil 
influences, and was desirous to avoid them. 

It can never be known, of course, to what extent the 
Jesuits molded the opinions of Pius IX. But as they had 
employed the whole period after their re-establishment in en- 
deavoring to dictate to all the popes, and were eminently 
successful with Gregory XVI, it may fairly be supposed that 
the unsuspecting and impressible mind of Pius IX was un- 
able to detect their cunning, and consequently became in- 
fluenced by them. Taking into consideration everything 
bearing upon their relations with him, in so far as they can 
be now known, the conclusion is inevitable that their expul- 
sion from Italy by the pope was not only the result of im- 
perative necessity, but the highest possible evidence of their 
uu worthiness. This is the natural and unavoidable inference 
from the fact itself. Nevertheless, he had already gone so 
far in attempting to enforce doctrines which the people at- 
tributed to the Jesuits, that even their expulsion did not 
relieve him from the suspicion of haviug already yielded too 
much to them. On this account he may have derived more 
harm than benefit from it. Whilst they remained in Italy 
they served as a shield, protecting him, in a large degree, 
from public censure ; for as the people loved him and hated 
them, they had to stand in the front and receive- the full force 
of the indignation that fell upon him after their departure. 

When the Jesuits were out of the way, and it came to 
be seen that Pius IX still adhered to their obnoxious doc- 
trines with regard to an independent constitutional govern- 
ment and the religious obligation to maintain the temporal 
power of the pope as a tenet of faith, he found himself, far 
more than before, unable to escape the public criticism and 
reproof. If he had pursued his course up to this time with- 
out having given due consideration to possible results, and 
was then for the first time brought to reflect upon them, it 
is not easy to see how he failed to realize that he had gone 
too far, and had put it out of his power to arrest the cur- 
rent of events then rapidly hastening to the very results he 



TEMPORAL POWER OVERTHROWN. 311 

deplored the most. He had probably Dever suffered himsell 
to regard the people as a power to be dreaded ; for, besides 
knowing their inclination to be faithful to the Church and 
their personal esteem for him, he was manifestly influenced 
by the belief that the combinations between Church and 
State were sufficiently powerful to suppress any popular up- 
rising in favor of constitutional government. If these ideas 
occupied his thoughts, he must have become satisfied, after 
he had expelled the Jesuits, that he had been deluded by 
them, and that they had been the real authors of his mis- 
fortunes. It is not probable, however, that his excitement 
subsided sufficiently for calm reflection. Nor is it likely 
that anything occurred to awaken him from his dream of 
security until he discovered that his renewed effort at reform 
had no other effect than to assure the Italian people that 
their independence could be achieved only by abolishing the 
temporal power of the pope by means of an alliance with 
Sardinia. He had unwisely made the issue with his own 
people, and was no longer able to control it. 

The imminence of war led to sending Italian troops to 
the frontier to drive out the Austrians ; and as Pius IX 
could not take part in such a war because he considered 
himself "the father of all the faithful" — the Austrians in- 
cluded — he begged the Emperor of Austria to withdraw his 
troops, and sent a nuncio to the King of Sardinia, inviting 
his co-operation in forming a confederacy of Italian republics, 
with the pope at its head! The emperor refused to comply 
with his request; and the king had no leisure to devote to 
impracticable and visionary schemes with such an enemy as 
Austria near at hand, ready to strip him of his territories 
and convert Sardinia into an Austrian dependency. The 
Austrians, becoming incensed at the movements of the Italian 
troops, announced that they would treat them as bandits and 
brigands, and threatened to invade and desolate the Italian 
provinces. The Italians, therefore, having failed to obtain 
any assistance or encouragement from the pope, although he 
insisted that he was their rightful king and they his subjects, 



312 FOOTPRINTS OF TEE JESUITS. 

and being left to deal alone with Austria, had to make choice 
between war and degradation. Under these circumstances 
they could not fail to realize that everything pertaining to 
their future prosperity and interests commanded the former — 
their pride forbade the latter. Hence, the war from that 
time was, upon their part, in self-defense. And it was not 
difficult to see, from the beginning, that with such an ad- 
versary as Austria to contend against, and the pope resist- 
ing rather than aiding them, the Italians were compelled 
to rely upon their alliance with Sardinia, which by that time 
had become separated from the influences dictated by the 
"Holy Alliance," and was rapidly becoming an important 
and independent power. 

At the battle of Novara, between Austria and Sardinia, 
Charles Albert, the Sardinian king, was defeated with ter- 
rible loss. He immediately abdicated his office and turned 
over the crown to Victor Emmanuel, his son, who so con- 
ducted affairs as to make himself influential in the great 
movements that led to the peace of Villa franca, and by 
skillful statesmanship to procure from the Austrians the re- 
cession of Lombardy to Sardinia. The military strength of 
Sardinia having been thus increased, greatly encouraged the 
Italians, and in order to counteract the influences which 
were tending to an alliance between them and Victor Em- 
manuel, the proposition to create an Italian confederacy, with 
the pope at its head, was revived. But the Italians, who had 
become unwilling to submit to the dominion of an absolute 
monarch any longer, resisted this scheme, from the convic- 
tion that it would still keep them at the feet of their old 
masters. And to make this resistance more effective, several 
of the Italian provinces transferred their allegiance to Sar- 
dinia, thus increasing her strength beyond what it had ever 
been, and adding to her importance as a military power. 

The attitude occupied by Sardinia after these accessions, 
introduced into the politics of Europe a new and most im- 
portant question — whether these revolted Italian provinces 
should be compelled to return under the temporal dominion 



TEMPORAL POWER OVERTHROWN. 313 

of the pope, or be allowed to settle their own position and 
destiny for themselves ? Although this question involved 
the principle of self-government, it was considered as having 
somewhat an international aspect, and consequently attracted 
the notice of other powers beside those immediately inter- 
ested. Louis Napoleon had, in the meantime, made himself 
Emperor of France, and being fully imbued with the " Na- 
poleonic idea " of his own importance, ventured to suggest to 
Pius IX, by way of advice, that it would be well for him 
and the Church to let the revolted provinces "go in peace." 
The pope, however, scornfully rejected this advice, and de- 
clared that he preferred death to such degradation — in which 
it is fair to suppose he was sincere. But his refusal settled 
nothing, having only invited renewed resistance to his policy 
among the Italians. It led, however, to such results that 
the right of the Italian provinces to unite with Sardinia, if 
they deemed it expedient, was recognized. This was a prac- 
tical question, as it involved the right of the people of each 
province to remain under the rule of the pope or not at their 
pleasure. As was to be expected, Pius IX considered this 
as a death-blow aimed at his temporal power, and, conse- 
quently, anathematized it severely. From the papal stand- 
point he could not have done otherwise. And yet, if he had 
rightfully interpreted the passing events, he could have seen 
that the temporal scepter was rapidly passing out of his 
hands, and that severe measures upon his part, instead of 
preventing, would only hasten that result. The violence of 
his resistance was responded to by Parma and Modena, both 
of which provinces were annexed to Sardinia. Tuscany and 
the iEmilian provinces followed by the votes of an immense 
majority of the people. Other provinces also followed their 
example. And thus, by means of these important acces- 
sions, Victor Emmanuel was enabled to signalize his reign by 
converting Sardinia into the Kingdom of Italy. This measure 
of attraction having been presented to the Italians, soon be- 
came an enthusiastic rallying-point, and the Two Sicilies, 
under the lead of Garibaldi, united with Sardinia by a pop- 



314 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

ular vote Dearly unanimous. Urabria and Ancoua did the 
same. One by one, therefore, these Italian provinces, filled 
with Roman Catholic populations, separated themselves by 
solemn votes from the temporal dominion of the pope, and 
left Pius IX to mourn over his rapidly-sinking fortunes, and 
to repent — if his excited passions allowed of repentance — 
over the folly which had produced that result. 

The Government of Sardinia, without unnecessary delay, 
enacted such laws as were demanded by this new condition 
of affairs. Victor Emmanuel endeavored, consequently, to 
open negotiations with a view to bring about a reconciliation 
between the two powers, spiritual and temporal. This prop- 
osition involved, necessarily, the separation of Church and 
State, and was designed to define the respective spheres and 
functions of each, so that in the future there should be no 
conflict or rivalry between them. Victor Emmanuel was a 
Roman Catholic, and neither expressed nor entertained the 
desire to impair, in any degree whatsoever, the spiritual au- 
thority or independence of the pope. Nor did any such de- 
sire prevail among the great body of the people who had 
aided in bringing about the new order of things — they still 
remaining Roman Catholic, as they had always been. All 
that he and they desired was to make the State independent 
of the Church in the enactment and administration of tem- 
poral laws, and to leave the Church, with the pope remain- 
ing its head, independent of the State in spiritual affairs. If 
in this a model for imitation had been needed, it would have 
been found in the form of government constructed by the 
people of the United States, which must have influenced 
those conducting Sardinian affairs at all events to the ex- 
tent of separating Church and State. But Pius IX could 
not consent to this without being unfaithful to the cause of 
the papacy, as distinct from the welfare and best interest of 
the Church, which manifestly required that he should con- 
ciliate, and not further antagonize, the Roman Catholic pop- 
ulations in wdiose behalf the proposition of the Sardinian 
Government was made. Instead of conciliation, however, 



TEMPORAL POWER OVERTHROWN. 315 

he — with a mind singularly constituted and curiously er- 
ratic — surrendered himself entirely to the dominion of his 
passions, and, in order to condemn that form of government 
and to rebuke the amicable spirit exhibited by Victor Emman- 
uel, issued a pontifical allocution, which may well be called 
" brutum fulmen," because it was made entirely harmless by 
the violence of its language, as well as by its inconsiderate 
and intemperate assault upon the leading principles which 
prevail among modern nations. Inasmuch as this allocu- 
tion was intended to be an official announcement of the 
faith maintained by him upon the politico-religious questions 
involved, and was of so recent date, it deserves special con- 
sideration, because of its direct bearing upon the question of 
restoring the pope's temporal power. Where else shall we 
look for papal doctrines but to the infallible head of the 
.papacy ? 

He accused the new Government of Italy with " attack- 
ing the Catholic Church, its wholesome laws, and all its 
sacred ministers" — an accusation which lost its force by the 
excess of its misrepresentation, as the facts just detailed abun- 
dantly show. The burden of this attack was the proposed 
separation of Church and State; but, besides other matters of 
which he complained, he specially designated civil mar- 
riages — such as are provided for by the laws of all the States 
of the United States — which he said " encouraged a con- 
cubinage that is perfectly scandalous." He meant by this 
that the issue of all marriages solemnized otherwise than by 
the Roman Catholic clergy are bastardized by the unchristian 
and illegitimate character of the ceremony. And with the 
express view, doubtless, of fully explaining himself upon the 
vital question then pending, he announced his claim to " civil 
authority " — that is, his right to wear the crown of a temporal 
king — by declaring that he and his successors never can be 
" subject to any lay power," but must ''exercise, in entire 
liberty, supreme authority and jurisdiction over the Church " 
in all its entirety. His idea — more than once repeated by 
him, and affirmed by his successor — was this : that, in what- 



316 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

soever country the Church shall have a footing, it shall not 
be governed by the temporal laws of the State in conflict 
with its interests, but only by the Canon laws which it has 
itself provided, and which confer upon the popes plenary and 
sovereign power to define what they may do and require of 
others within the domain of faith and morals, along with the 
coercive power necessary to secure obedience. Seemingly un- 
conscious that he was placing himself in the track of the pop- 
ular storm then sweeping away the props upon which the 
papal throne had long rested, he fancied that his " apostolic 
authority " would yet enable him so to direct its course as 
would prevent the final wreck of the temporal power. Put- 
ting on, therefore, his full papal armor in imitation of some 
of his predecessors, he endeavored to upturn and destroy the 
new Government of Italy by the thunder of his anathemas. 
He, accordingly, abrogated and declared " null and void, and 
without force and effect," all its laws and decrees in conflict 
with his claim of supreme and absolute authority over both 
spiritual and temporal affairs throughout the whole of Italy, 
including the provinces annexed to Sardinia ! It requires a 
very inventive imagination to conceive of an act of more su- 
preme folly than this useless allocution. 1 

If Pius IX had been less perturbed, and calm enough to 
reason logically, he might have observed how fatal to his 
own conclusion was an important confession made by him in 
this official allocution. Without seeming to comprehend its 
full meaning and force, he declared it to be " a singular ar- 
rangement of Divine providence " that the pope " was in- 
vested with his civil authority" at tlie time of the fall of the 
Roman Empire; that is, during the latter half of the fifth 
century, and nearly five hundred years after the beginning of 
the Christian era. In this he admits — certainly by necessary 



1 Appleton's Ann. Cj-clo., 1866, p. 674. " The pope had lost all his 
bygone sympathy for the popular cause, and was only too willing to 
secure his restoration to the Vatican by the aid of an Austrian occu- 
pation of the Romagna, and of a French siege of Rome." (Life of 
Victor Emmanuel. By Dicey. Page 118.) 



TEMPORAL POWER OVERTHROWN. 317 

implication — that during all the long period preceding that 
event, the affairs of the Church had beeu conducted without 
the assistance of a temporal monarch at Rome or elsewhere, 
and by spiritual authority alone — by bishops who looked after 
religious and not political affairs. 2 He must have been guilty 
of a singular omission of duty if it did not occur to him to 
inquire why so great and radical a change in the manage- 
ment of Church affairs had not been made before the fall of 
the Roman Empire, but had been deferred until that partic- 
ular period. It is easy enough to understand how the popes 
may have become kings in a purely temporal sense, after that 
event; but that was not the question he was considering. 
His object was to show that when the Roman Empire fell, 
the temporal power was divinely added to the spiritual 
power of the pope, and, therefore, that it would violate the 
divine law if he were deprived of the crown of temporal 
royalty, which the popes of the primitive times did not pos- 
sess. A little calm reflection might have enabled him to see, 
in the light of his own statement, what fallacy there is in the 
pretense that belief in the Divine establishment of the tem- 
poral power is a necessary and essential part of true religious 
faith; for if it had been the Divine purpose that Christianity 
should not exist without it, that purpose would have been 
fulfilled long before the fall of the Roman Empire. The 
concession of Pius IX must consequently be taken as fatal 
to the claim of temporal power as necessarily pertaining to 
the cause of Christianity or to the Church as a religious 
body. The primitive Christians had no knowledge of it, 
and the fact that they had not — which he concedes — suggests 
such a contrast between what the early Church was imme- 

2 During the progress of the Italian revolution, the present pope, 
Leo XIII, then Cardinal Pecci, wrote a pastoral letter " On the Tem- 
poral Dominion of the Popes," for the express purpose of maintaining 
that dominion. Referring to the period of its first introduction, he 
said it had been " consecrated by eleven centuries of time." Neither he 
nor Pius IX has been able to fix the time, except in general and in- 
definite terms, differing, as they do, several hundred years, yet both in- 
fallible! (Life of Leo XIII. By Bernard O'Reilly. Page 200.) 



318 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

diately following the apostolic period, and what it became 
after the papacy was established by means alone of the tem- 
poral power, as to show conclusively that the papal pretense 
of sovereignty must have been the result of usurpation. 

The condition of the European nations at the period here 
referred to — although certainly not designed for that pur- 
pose by the chief actors — was favorable to the cause of Ital- 
ian independence. The jealousies and rivalries among the 
sovereigns had brought them into such relations as to require 
immense standing armies to keep watch over each other. 
Austria was not only one of the most restless, but the most 
arbitrary of the great powers, and soon found it necessary, 
of her own accord, to withdraw her armies from Italy, in 
order to protect herself against attack at exposed points 
within her own borders. The removal of this formidable 
adversary greatly encouraged the whole populations of the 
Italian peninsula, among whom the desire to become united 
with the kingdom of Italy became almost universal. After 
Venetia, by a vote practically unanimous, decided to do so, 
the revolutionary spirit was greatly aroused. There were, 
however, among the revolutionists, some who were so enthu- 
siastic as to demand a republic, which, for a time, somewhat 
threatened the cause of independence. All of these favored 
the new Government under Victor Emmanuel to a longer 
continuance of papal rule, but desired to dispense with a 
king entirely, preferring that the entire political sovereignty 
should be vested in the people. These readily rallied at the 
call of Garibaldi, and made preparations for attacking Rome. 
In the meantime, after the withdrawal of the Austrians, 
Louis Napoleon — acting under a species of infatuation which 
he never could well explain, and nobody could fully under- 
stand — had sent a large body of French troops to Italy to 
protect the temporal power of Pius IX, and hold him upon 
the throne, it having been fully demonstrated by this time 
that nothing but foreign military force could do so. The 
Garibaldians were defeated by the French, which event, al- 
though it produced a temporary sadness among the patriotic 



TEMPORAL POWER OVERTHROWN. 319 

Italians, did not intimidate them. The course of events 
among the sovereigns favored their cause to such a degree 
that there are far better grounds for saying that they were 
providentially designed to abolish the temporal power than 
there are in support of the pretense that it was divinely es- 
tablished at the fall of the Roman Empire, or at any other 
time. Louis Napoleon had his own affairs to look after. 
His stealth of the imperial crown of France had given fresh 
spur to his ambition, but his perfidy was so flagrant that 
even among the stanchest monarchists he was held in con- 
tempt. His self-conceit made war between Prussia and 
France inevitable ; and when that event was brought on, he 
realized, probably for the first time, that he had been en- 
gaged in the ignominious work of preventing the independ- 
ence of Italy, and forcing the Italian people to accept a 
king they had almost unanimously decided to reject. Whether 
he fully realized this or not, his necessities compelled him to 
withdraw the French troops from Italy, and to leave Pius 
IX without the support of foreign troops, who had stood 
guard over his temporal crown during every hour of his 
pontificate. The war between Prussia and France was a ter- 
rible blow at Pius IX, but an event of incalculable value to 
the cause of Italian independence. And when it led to Sedan, 
the capture of Paris, and the loss of Alsace and Lorraine 
by France, Victor Emmanuel steadily kept his eyes upon the 
unification of Italy, which even Pius IX understood to mean 
the abolition of the temporal power. 

Victor Emmanuel again had an opportunity of acting 
frankly towards the pope and fairly with the Church. He 
endeavored to explain himself in a letter to Pius IX, wherein, 
"with the faith of a Catholic" but "with the dignity of a 
king," he declared that it was not his purpose to impair or 
interfere with the spiritual authority or independence of the 
pope, and that he would maintain these with his troops; 
and, counseling him to recognize the stubborn facts which 
confronted him and which he was powerless to change, he 
urged him to accept this as the only practical and possible 



320 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

solution of the difficulties surrounding him. He closed his 
appeal in these words: "Your holiness, in delivering Rome 
from the foreign troops, in freeing it from the continual 
peril of being the battle-field of subversive parties, will have 
accomplished a marvelous work, given peace to the Church, 
and shown to Europe, shocked by the horrors of war, how 
great battles can be won and immortal victories achieved by 
an act of justice, and by a single word of affection." 3 Here, 
in an eloquent and touching appeal, the king implored the 
pope to ''give peace to the Church," well knowing, as he 
did, that the only purpose of the revolution was to get rid of 
the temporal power and establish a constitutional govern- 
ment, and that if this question were disposed of by the ac- 
quiescence of Pius IX the vast multitude of Roman Catholics 
then in arms would return to their homes and be content 
to live in peace and quiet under his spiritual dominion. 
The issue was a single and a simple one, which could not 
be misunderstood ; and that it should be made so clear that 
even the commonest mine' could comprehend it fully, Victor 
Emmanuel accompanied his letter with a statement of the 
terms which he proposed for adjusting the relations between 
the Church and the State. They were these: All nations 
should have free access to the pope; all Churches in Rome 
to be neutralized ; ambassadors to the pope to enjoy full im- 
munity ; the cardinals to retain their revenues and immu- 
nity ; the salaries of all military and civil functionaries to be 
paid as before; and the bishops and clergy throughout Italy 



3 Maguire, p. 470. Appleton's Ann. Cyc, 1870, p. 410. 

After the occupation of Rome by the Italian army, the citizens 
were required to decide by the form of a plebiscite, whether or no they 
favored union with the kingdom of Italy, when the popular vote was 
133,681 in favor of, and only 1,507 against it. Victor Emmanuel there- 
upon signified his loyalty to the Church in this strong and expressive 
language: "Asa king and as a Catholic, while I hereby proclaim the 
unity of Italy, 1 remain constant to my resolve to guarantee the 
liberty of the Church and the independence of the supreme pontiff." 
(Life of Victor Emmanuel. By Dicey. Pages 317-318. ) 



TEMPORAL POWER OVERTHROWN. 321 

to have "the full and absolutely free exercise of their eccle- 
siastical functions." 

It would be hard, if not impossible, for a liberal mind to 
find fault with these propositions. They were so generally 
accepted as fair that any comment upon them is unneces- 
sary. They encountered no objection — except from those who 
preferred that the pope should remain an absolute temporal 
monarch, with full power to make and unmake all the laws — ■ 
to a constitutional government representing the people. They 
were made by a Roman Catholic king, representing and speak- 
ing for several millions of Roman Catholic people, and, be- 
sides being in a conciliatory and kindly spirit, bore upon 
their face conclusive evidence of sincerity. If they had been 
accepted by the pope, the true faith of the Church would 
have been untouched, and the pope in the full possession of all 
his rightful and necessary spiritual powers. The Church, in 
fact, would have been brought back to its primitive condi- 
tion before the fall of the Roman Empire. But Pius IX, in- 
stead of reciprocating the generosity of the king, mourned 
over the "deep sorrow," which filled his "life with bit- 
terness," and, at the same time, treated the propositions of 
the king with intense scorn. He was then the first pope, in 
all the long history of the Church, who had been allowed 
authoritatively to avow his own personal infallibilty. He 
had convened the celebrated Council of the Vatican, in which, 
but a few weeks before, the Jesuits had succeeded in having 
him declared infallible by the passage of a decree dictated by 
himself, and secured by the suppression of debate, against the 
protest of a number of bishops, including several from the 
United States. 4 Having obtained this victory over the lib- 
eralism of the Church, and thus thrown himself completely 
into the arms of the Jesuits, and preferring an alliance with 
them to union with millions of Roman Catholics who favored 



4 Eight Months at Rome. By Pomponio Leto (Francis Vitteleschi). 
London Edition. Page 212. 

21 



322 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

a constitutional government, he made it impossible to take a 
single step towards conciliation, or to carry on even an ami- 
cable discussion with the king. He manifestly felt as if no 
human power had the right to demand or to expect concilia- 
tion or discussion from an infallible pope. The Council had 
affirmed his universal sovereignty, and had encouraged him 
in the belief that he possessed the power of omnipotence, so 
that those who refused obedience to him were under the curse 
of God. The time for debate, therefore, had passed with 
him, and no longer were thoughts of peace and conciliation 
to be entertained. Consequently, he is represented by a 
friendly pen as having, with an air of imperial majesty, 
broken off the official interview with the envoy of Victor 
Emmanuel, by expressing " the full measure of his scorn and 
indignation" in these expressive words: "In the name of 
Jems Christ, I tell you that you are all whited sepulchers /" 5 

There was nothing then left for Victor Emmanuel but to 
advance his troops, and take possession of the city of Rome, 
in the name of the new kingdom of Italy. He delayed no 
longer. After crossing the frontier of the papal territory, 
his army engaged in several skirmishes with the Zouaves of 
the pope, but met with no serious resistance. On the 20th 
of September, 1870, orders were given to attack the city. 
Two breaches were soon opened in the walls; and as the 
victorious Italians entered, the papal troops retreated, and 
Pius IX took refuge in the castle of St. Angelo as a fugitive 
from the city where, but a short time before, a decree of his 
personal infallibility had been forced through a packed Coun- 
cil by such methods as no other body of men in the world 
would have submitted to, and to which it is not likely they 
would have submitted but for the influences of the Jesuits. 
The pope having fled and made himself a voluntary prisoner 
in the castle of St. Angelo, the remaining duties pertaining 
to the papal Government devolved upon Cardinal Antonelli, 
who still called himself Secretary of State. This consisted of 



5 Maguire, p. 473. 



TEMPORAL POWER OVERTHROWN. 323 

a formal and puerile protest in the name of the fugitive pope, 
wherein he declared that nothing done by the kingdom of 
Italy had conveyed any rights whatsoever against the domin- 
ion and possession of the pope, and that the pope "both 
knows his rights, and intends to conserve them intact, and 
re-enter at the proper time into their actual possession" All that 
can be said of this is, that, whilst practically it was mere 
unmeaning bravado, it fully set forth the policy and pur- 
poses of Pius IX, by which he expected, with the aid of the 
two hundred millions of Roman Catholics in the world, to 
destroy the new Italian Government, and bring the people 
again under papal dominion. Strange fatuity, made the 
more strange by the fact that these announcements proceeded 
from the first pope whose personal infallibility had been ap- 
proved by conciliar decree! 

The possession of Rome and the flight of the pope made 
it necessary to put in operation the machinery of the new 
Government. Accordingly, a temporary Government was 
formed and provision made for taking the vote of the whole 
population to decide whether or no the people were for or 
against the "unification of Italy." At this vote an over- 
whelming majority decided in favor of the new Govern- 
ment — thus indicating that even if the people had hitherto 
been persuaded to believe that the kingship of the pope had 
been of Divine creation, they had become enlightened enough 
to understand that Providence had permitted it to continue 
long enough ; and that as it had succeeded in separating the 
Western from the Eastern Christians, and splitting the whole 
into rival and warring factions, the time had been reached 
when, by a new dispensation, the spiritual department of the 
Church should be purified by stripping the pope of his im- 
perial authority and enlarging the sphere of his spiritual 
functions and duties. Realizing that God governs the world 
in all things by his providences, and casting their eyes over 
the nations to see where the largest degree of prosperity 
and happiness prevailed, they were awakened to the convic- 
tion that, as these had been produced where Church and 



324 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

State were separated, the Divine wisdom had been displayed 
by pointing out to them a like measure of relief from their 
existing grievances. Taught by their own instincts to be- 
lieve that the shifting dispensations of God's providences were 
only so many methods of exhibiting his sovereign power, and 
that as he had permitted their forefathers and themselves to 
bear the burden of the papal temporal power for centuries, 
it was natural for them to conclude that he had at least 
indicated to them the duty of exchanging it for that liberty 
and intellectual development which free constitutional gov- 
ernments had assured to other peoples as the means of mak- 
ing them happier and more prosperous — better able to ap- 
preciate and discharge the duties which pertain to citizenship 
as well as to Christian life. God had tolerated their mis- 
fortunes only in the sense in which he has permitted slavery 
to exist; but they could not be persuaded to believe that he 
intended longer to perpetuate them by his providences, any 
more than can the people of this country consent that the 
former existence of slavery here overthrew the fundamental 
truth set forth in our Declaration of Independence, that the 
inalienable right to freedom and civil equality is derived 
from the natural law. 

A very large majority of the aggregate vote cast in the 
provinces having been in favor of the new Government — 
the negative vote having been less than two thousand — it 
became necessary to adjust the future relations between the 
Church and the State so that they could exist harmoniously 
together, each in full possession of its proper functions. 
Accordingly, the pope and all the papal authorities were 
notified that the utmost liberality would be displayed toward 
the Church, and that there would be no interference with it 
whatsoever except the abolition of the pope's temporal power, 
and such provisions in regard to temporal affairs as that 
rendered necessary. It is only necessary to observe the lead- 
ing provisions made by the new Government to show their 
liberality and to demonstrate the folly of their rejection ; 
and to realize how much the Church has lost by the unwise 



TEMPORAL POWER OVERTHROWN. 325 

and infatuated policy of Pius IX, it is sufficient to observe 
that there is no Government existing in the world to-day 
from which the same conciliatory terms could be obtained. 
Not all of them could have been obtained, even then, from 
any other but a Roman Catholic population. 

The policy of the new Government was set forth as fol- 
lows : The pope was to be left entirely free to exercise all 
his spiritual rights as before; he was to continue to possess 
" the prerogatives of a sovereign prince," and his court was to 
be provided for with that view; he was to be secured "a 
territorial immunity," limited, of course, within bounds to 
be defined, wherein he should be free and independent of 
the State; all the prelates, cardinals, archbishops, bishops, 
and those in ecclesiastical orders, who should be summoned 
to Rome by the pope, were to enjoy immunity from civil 
interference ; the pope was to be permitted to communicate 
with foreign powers and the Church throughout the world, 
and to have special postal and telegraphic service at his 
command ; all the representatives of foreign powers at the 
court of the pope were to enjoy perfect liberty ; freedom of 
publication and communication were assured ; the pope was 
guaranteed "full liberty to travel at all times, and at all 
seasons, in and out of the country," and was to be treated 
and honored as "a foreign lay sovereign" throughout Italy; 
his "royal appanage" and the members of his court were to 
be furnished by the new Government, which should also pay 
the debts of the pontifical States ; and the liberties of the 
Church and the spiritual independence of the pope were to 
be fully and amply guaranteed. 6 

These fair and liberal provisions had reference only to 
the changed relations produced by the abolition of the tem- 
poral power. They involved a purely political question, 
except as it had been made politico-religious by the doctrine 
of the Jesuits, which Pius IX had adopted, to the effect 
that it was a necessary part of the faith of the Church 



6 Appleton's Annual Cyclopedia. 1870. Pages 414-415. 



326 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

that the pope should be a temporal monarch. The Roman 
Catholic population of Italy having rejected this doctrine, 
and demanded the expulsion of the Jesuits because they 
taught it, these, provisions were the result of their desire to 
leave Pius IX in the full possession and enjoyment of all his 
spiritual powers. It was intended by them to provide merely 
for the new condition of affairs, and to recognize the king- 
dom of Italy as an accomplished fact, neither to be contro- 
verted nor changed. Victor Emmanuel, as a firm and con- 
sistent Roman Catholic, was not disposed to do anything less, 
and his obligations to the Italian people would not allow 
him to do more. But Pius IX, still continuing to sorrow 
over the destruction of the "old regime" and clinging to the 
Jesuit idea that God was offended because he had lost his 
temporal crown, refused to be reconciled. Bemoaning the 
incompetency of the people to decide what was right and 
what was wrong in affairs of government, and the inevitable 
ruin which he imagined would follow their attempt to be 
governed without a pope-king, he again hurled his fiercest 
anathemas at the new Government, and at the heads of all 
who had aided in its creation. And having done this, the 
controversy was brought to an end, leaving it well under- 
stood that Church and State had been finally separated in 
Italy by a Roman Catholic population, and that Pius IX 
would not be reconciled to the loss of his temporal sovereignty 
which that separation occasioned, or to anything short of his 
restoration to absolute royal power. There were other acts 
necessary to complete the entire drama, but these would 
draw us off into fields crowded with a multitude of combat- 
ants. We are now concerned only with the conflict about 
the temporal power, and the bearing of that power upon the 
right of the Italian people to have a voice in the construction 
of the Government, and the passage of such laws as their 
own welfare required. That was the only issue between the 
Italians and the papacy — between Victor Emmanuel and Pius 
IX. If the latter had adhered to the convictions of his own 
mind when he first introduced measures of reform, and had 



TEMPORAL POWER OVERTHROWN. 327 

followed the kindly dictates of his own heart, many heart- 
burnings and bickerings might have been avoided, and the 
Church might have escaped a serious and = staggering blow. 
The contestants upon both sides were attached to the Church, 
its history, its traditions, and its faith. A calm discussion 
between them as to what it had or had not taught with regard 
to the temporal power, would have made it clear that it did 
not involve any essential article of the Christian creed, and 
they might thus have been led to see that, as this power did 
not exist in the apostolic and primitive times, there could 
not rightfully exist in the changed condition of the world 
anything to render it absolutely necessary to the existence 
and growth of Christianity in the present age. But when 
Pius IX suffered his mind to be impressed by the teachings 
and doctrines of the Jesuits, and allowed them to mold his 
pontifical policy, passionate declamation took the place of 
calm discussion, and made reconciliation impossible. 

And now, when those most devoted to the Church look 
back upon this conflict, and realize upon what a multitude 
of their Christian brethren the papal anathemas are still rest- 
ing, because of their refusal to assent to a dogma of faith 
which strikes at the foundation of free constitutional gov- 
ernment, they can not fail to observe that, whilst the blow 
has fallen heavily upon the Church, the Jesuits alone 
have achieved a triumph. They laid the foundation of 
this triumph by extorting from Pius IX — at a time when 
his unsuspicious nature was easily imposed upon — his cele- 
brated Encyclical and Syllabus, whereby he declared that 
freedom of speech, of conscience, and of the press were 
errors which the Church could not tolerate; that the Church 
must be the sole judge of its own jurisdiction, and possess 
the power of coercing obedience within the circle it shall as- 
sign to itself; and that it never can become reconciled to, or 
agree with, the " progress, liberalism, and civilization" of the 
presen t age. By this he placed a barrier between the papacy 
and all the leading modern nations, which the Jesuits are 
striving hard to overleap, but can not; but which can only 



328 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

be broken down by that Christian charity which ennobles the 
nature of its possessor, and teaches that God has implanted in 
the hearts of mankind a spirit of brotherhood which no creeds 
or dogmas or ceremonies should be permitted to extinguish. 

But Pius IX added to his sufferings by the pretense of 
hardships that were not real. He was allowed to return to 
Rome unmolested, and to take up his residence again in the 
Vatican. He called himself a prisoner, and induced others 
to do so, thereby setting an example his successor has imi- 
tated. But he was not a prisoner, except when he, of his 
own,accord, shut himself up in the castle of St. Angelo. He 
was, up till the close of his life, free to go wheresover and 
when he pleased. There was no restraint imposed upon his 
actions. No indignity to his spiritual office or to his person 
was allowed. He could open and close the doors of the 
Vatican at his own pleasure, and admit or exclude whomso- 
ever he pleased. He enjoyed the utmost liberty of speech 
and of writing, and bestowed praise or censure at discretion. 
But instead of enjoying the real liberty guaranteed to him by 
the laws of the Government upon which his pontifical curse 
was resting, he wore his life away by useless complaining, 
and by sending forth additional anathemas, which indicated 
only that his vanity was ungratified and his ambition disap- 
pointed. He died at last, not broken-hearted — for he was al- 
ways a spiritual sovereign — but with the melancholy conscious- 
ness that his pontifical arm had become too feeble to bear up 
the temporal scepter which many of his predecessors had 
grasped so tightly. It would be hard to write his life well 
and faithfully ; it was so impulsive, varied, and feverish. His 
purposes were honest, his affections sincere, his generosity 
unbounded, his nature kindly and sympathetic; but he was 
as powerless to drive back the storm that beat upon the 
papacy, as a seaman is to check the speed of the winds when 
the storm is raging. And now that he has appeared before 
the final Judge, who is infallible, it might be appropriately 
engraved upon his tomb that he was a good priest but a 
poor and incompetent statesman. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

PAPAL DEMANDS. 

At the death of Pius IX he left to whosoever should 
succeed him, as an official inheritance, the decision of the 
question whether or no the Church should acquiesce in and 
become reconciled to the abolition of the temporal power of 
the pope, or be agitated and possibly further disrupted by 
the demand for its restoration. In the meantime Italy had 
become an organized nation, and was so recognized through- 
out the world. The capital, after several removals, had been 
established at Rome, and legislative chambers were assembled 
almost within the shadow of the old senate-house of the 
Csesars, under the checks and guards of a written Constitu- 
tion, to enact laws for and in the name of the Italian people. 
A king existed, but without absolute power, and had attained 
great popularity on account of his eminent fitness and recog- 
nized fidelity to the trusts committed to him. It, conse- 
quently, required but little practical knowledge of affairs to 
foresee that the future peace and welfare of the Church de- 
pended, in a large degree, upon the policy to be pursued 
with regard to the temporal power — which no longer existed, 
but had been abolished by Roman Catholic populations, who 
had, with great deliberation and extraordinary unanimity, 
taken the right to manage their own political affairs into 
their own hands, in imitation of the example set them by the 
people of the United States. Thoughtful minds were in- 
spired by the hope that moderate, wise, and conciliatory 
counsels would prevail with the new pope, whosoever he 
might be. 

The occasion rendered it necessary that the distinction 
between the Church as a Christian organization, and the 

329 



330 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

papacy as a magisterial power over temporals, should be 
observed; that is, that the ability of the former for Christian 
usefulness was left unimpaired, whilst the latter was only 
designed to make the pope an absolute monarch over the 
Italian people. Nobody understood this better than Pius 
IX, and, therefore, the year before his death he signalized 
the first important exhibition of his infallible authority by 
issuing a decree amending the Confession of Faith, which had 
been prescribed by Pius IV nearly three hundred years be- 
fore, and an "allocution," or authoritative and ex-catliedra 
epistle to the clergy and the Church, with regard to the re- 
lations existing between the Church and the Government of 
Italy. The former concerns only those whose faith is influ- 
enced by it ; the latter concerns all the progressive nations, 
and none more than the United States. 

In this allocution he accused the invaders of his "civil 
principality" — that is, of his temporal power — with riding 
roughshod over every right, human aud divine ; with the 
attempt to undermine "all the institutions of the Church;" 
and characterized the act of establishing the Italian kingdom 
as one of "sovereign iniquity" — a "sacrilegious invasion." 
He complained that the ministers of religion " were deprived 
of the right of disapproving the laws of the State which they 
considered as violating those of the Church" — which was 
equivalent to asserting it to be a principle of faith that he 
and the clergy should be permitted to defy any law of a 
State which he and they considered violative of their pre- 
rogative rights. He pointed out "the shameful and obscene 
spectacle" to be seen in Rome, in "the temples erected in 
these latter days to dissenting worship;" in "schools of cor- 
ruption scattered broadcast," and in "houses of perdition 
established everywhere" — thus intending, undoubtedly, to 
intimate what his meaning was when he said in his Syllabus, 
a few years before, that the Church could never be recon- 
ciled to the spirit of progress prevailing among the progress- 
ive nations. He insisted that the pope can not exist in 



PAPAL DEMANDS. 331 

Rome except as "a sovereign or a prisoner" — which has 
been disproved by all the subsequent years of actual ex- 
perience — and that there can be no "peace, security, or tran- 
quillity for the entire Catholic Church so long as the exercise 
of the supreme ecclesiastical ministry is at the mercy of the 
passions of party, the caprice of Governments, the vicissitudes 
of political elections, and of the projects and actions of de- 
signing men" — meaning thereby, in plain words, that the 
pope must be so supreme wheresoever his clergy are as to re- 
quire them to execute his decrees, notwithstanding the laws 
of Governments shall expressly provide otherwise. He ex- 
presses this idea with equal plainness by saying that the pope 
"can not exercise full freedom in the power of his min- 
istry" scattered throughout the world, so long as he "con- 
tinues subject to the will of another party ;" in other words, 
that he must be free to require his clergy, wheresoever they 
may be, to obey him and not the laws of any Government 
in conflict with his will. He congratulates himself that the 
"whole Catholic people," everywhere, are united with him 
in supporting all these propositions, and makes it known 
that he expects them "to take in hand the cause and de- 
fense of the Roman pontificate ;" that is, the restoration of the 
temporal power and kingship of the pope. He expresses 
the belief that the attachment shown to him by the multi- 
tudes of pilgrims who visit Rome '* will go on increasing 
until the day when the pastor of the universal Church will 
be restored at last to the possession of his full and genuine 
freedom " — which he can not enjoy without the crown of 
absolute monarchy upon his head. And with a view to the 
accomplishment of this, he instructs all the ministers of the 
Church, everywhere, to " exhort the faithful confided to 
them to make use of all the means which the laws of their 
country place within their reach ; to act with promptness with 
those who govern ; to induce these latter to consider more 
attentively the painful situation forced upon the head of the 
Church, and take effective measures towards dissipating the 



332 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

obstacles that stand in the way of his absolute independ- 



ence." 1 



All this is plain and emphatic — not susceptible of mis- 
understanding. It makes the restoration of the temporal 
power of the pope, so as to make him king of Italy against 
the positive and expressed will of the people of that country, 
a politico-religious question, and commands the faithful in 
every part of the world to form themselves into a politico- 
religious party to influence the Governments of their re- 
spective countries to contribute to that result. This counsel 
is given in face of what the world knows to be the fact, that 
the temporal power can not be restored without war — with- 
out drenching the plains of Italy with blood, in order to 
force upon the people of Italy a king whom they have re- 
pudiated by their highest act of sovereignty. 

This allocution was among the first fruits of the pope's 
infallibility, and makes known with distinctness the method 
dictated by Pius IX for reconstructing the papacy. At the 
time of its issuance he had encountered so many embarrass- 
ments without the ability to resist them successfully, he 
could scarcely have expected that his hopes would be realized 
during his pontificate. He was confronted by the existence 
of a kingdom, still Roman Catholic but not papal, within 
the limits of which Rome w r as included, and no man knew 
better than he that what he sought after would have to 
await the formation of a politico-religious party beyond the 
limits of Italy, and among the peoples of other nations, 
strong enough to coerce the Roman Catholic people of Italy, 
at the point of the bayonet, into obedience to the papacy 
they had repudiated. Therefore this infallible allocution 
may properly be considered his last pontifical will and testa- 
ment, whereby he devised all his right and title to the 
temporal power to his successor; or perhaps it would be more 
apt to say, as the politicians do, that it was intended to be 



1 Appleton's American Cyclopedia. 1877. Pages 677 to G81. 



PAPAL DEMANDS. 333 

the main plank in the papal platform. How far it became 
so we shall see. 

When, after the death of Pius IX, the cardinals assem- 
bled in Conclave, February 17, 1878, their first official act 
was specially significant. It displayed a settled purpose to 
hold the wavering, if there were any, to the policy of Pius 
IX with reference to the restoration of the temporal power, 
and to make that the test of fidelity to the Church ; in other 
words, that his successor should be pledged to carry out that 
policy, and elected with that express view. The cardinals, 
therefore, entered into an agreement among themselves to 
confirm and maintain all the protests made by Pius IX 
against the Italian Government. This agreement was to the 
effect that they " thereby renewed all the protests and reser- 
vations made by the deceased sovereign pontiff, whether 
against the occupation of the States of the Church, or 
against the laws and decrees enacted to the detriment of the 
same Church and the Apostolic See ;" and that they were 
unanimously "determined to follow the course marked out 
by the deceased pontiff, whatsoever trials may happen to 
befall them through the force of events." 2 

It may fairly be supposed that Cardinal Peeci was the 
projector of this plan of procedure, as it is stated by his 
biographer that he " stood in the foremost place at the head 
of his brethren." At all events, he, together with the other 
cardinals, was pledged to it. When, therefore, he was elected 
pope — as he was soon after — and took the name of Leo XIII, 
he accepted the pontificate under the solemn obligation so to 
employ all his powers and prerogatives as to regain the tem- 
poral power his predecessor had lost, upon the distinct 
ground that fidelity to the doctrines and faith of the Church 
required it. 

In view of the result to be thus attained, the election of 
Leo XIII was unquestionably wise. Besides possessing the 



2 Life of Leo XIII. By O'Reilly. Page 299. 



334 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

highest intellectual qualifications — being, in fact, one of the 
foremost men of the present time — his Christian character is 
pure and without a blemish. He is cool, calm, and delib- 
erate in considering great questions, and not apt, as Pius IX 
was, to be misled by indiscreet advisers, or entrapped by 
enemies. His passions seemed well restrained, and he brought 
to the duties of his high office abilities far exceeding those of 
any of the eminent men who composed the College of Cardi- 
nals. There is not a sovereign in Europe of whom he is 
not the equal, if not the superior, in all such qualities as fit a 
man for rank, station, and authority. In the rightful and 
proper sphere of his spiritual duties he is "sans peur et sans 
reproclw." But when he ventures to depart from that sphere, 
and employ the authority of his high office to reopen a 
political issue already closed, to deny to the people of Italy 
the right to regulate their own temporal affairs, as those of 
the United States have done, and prescribes or approves a 
plan of Church organization which shall measure the value of 
a professed Christian life by the depth to which its possessor 
shall siuk in the mire of politico-religious controversy in 
those countries where Church and State have been separated, 
he presents himself to the world in another and different as- 
pect. If, by imitating others who have grasped after kingly 
crowns, he sees proper to lay aside the rightful weapons of 
his spiritual ministry, and arm himself and his followers with 
such as pertain to the strife of politics, there can be no just 
ground of complaint against those whose policy of civil gov- 
ernment he assails, if they shall arraign him and them at the 
bar of public opinion, and challenge his and their right to 
disturb the peace by scattering the seeds of discord among 
them. 

The people of Italy achieved their independence by rev- 
olution, and decided to separate Church and State, and that 
they would not have the pope for their king ; they put an end 
to the absolute monarchism of the papacy, and substituted a 
constitutional monarchy, with such checks and guards as they 
deemed necessary to their own protection. In doing this they 



PAPAL DEMANDS. 335 

exercised the same power of popular sovereignty as the people 
of the United States, when they decided that no king should 
ever rule over them. In each case the act was intended to be 
final — not subject to reversal by any earthly power. Neither 
country, therefore, has the right to plot against the quiet 
and peace of the other ; nor have the populations of either 
the right to do so. All this is forbidden by the law of 
nations, and if knowingly tolerated would be, by that law, 
just cause of war. If a politico-religious party should be 
formed in Italy to change our institutions by reuniting 
Church and State, and substitute a king in the place of the 
people in the management of public affairs, it would incite 
the spirit of resistance in every loyal American heart. And 
if a politico-religious party, formed under any plea whatso- 
ever, shall be permitted to combine in this country for the 
avowed object of reuniting Church and State in Italy, and 
compelling the people of that country to accept the pope as 
an absolute sovereign, in the face of the result they have ac- 
complished by their revolution, wherein do we escape con- 
demnation by the law of nations ? The question whether or 
no any people shall exercise the right of self-government is 
political, not religious. This has been decided by the people 
of the United States. Consequently, to demand of them 
that they shall reverse this decision, violates the spirit of their 
institutions, and mocks at their authority. 

No liberal and fair-minded people questioned the right of 
Pius IX to declare himself infallible, or that of others to 
concede it to him, in matters purely spiritual. Nor is this 
same right denied to Leo XIII. But when he extends his in- 
fallibility so far as to include authority over the fundamental 
principles of civil government, and thus seeks to imperil the 
fortunes of the modern progressive nations where Church 
and State have been separated, it should not be expected 
that those who share those fortunes in common will sanction 
his imperial assumption by direct affirmance or by silent 
acquiescence. The age of " passive obedience" has passed, 
and is not likely to be revived so long as the Keformation 



336 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

period shall continue to bear its rich and abundant fruits, 
like such as spring from the popular institutions of the 
United States. The fundamental principle upon which all 
such institutions rest is the separation of Church and State; 
for without that there can be no freedom of religious belief 
and no such development of the intellectual faculties as fits 
society for self-government. Every assault upon this great 
fundamental principle must be resisted, no matter under 
what pretense it may be made or from what quarter it shall 
come. When it was assaulted and condemned by the vacil- 
lating and irascible Pius IX, it was in far less peril than now, 
when the calm and sagacious Leo XIII has become the gen- 
eral-in-chief of the aggressive forces. The former was not 
even master of himself — the latter is master of vast multi- 
tudes of men. 

The election of Leo XIII caused general satisfaction out- 
side the circle of Church influence. He was regarded as a 
representative of the highest enlightenment, and this gave 
rise to the hope that he would become reconciled to the ex- 
isting condition of affairs in Italy, in order to pacify those 
members of the Church who had wrenched from his imme- 
diate predecessor the scepter of temporal sovereignty. A 
more favorable opportunity for pacification could not have 
existed ; and if it had been accepted in a conciliatory spirit, 
the rejoicing would not have been confined to the Italians 
alone, but would have been well-nigh universal. But little 
time elapsed, however, before there were signs indicating 
that, instead of throwing oil upon the troubled waters, he 
preferred that they should remain in agitation. Two facts 
now conspire to account for this : First, the agreement made 
by the College of Cardinals to adopt the principles and 
adhere to the policy of Pius IX ; and, second, his Jesuit 
education and training. Both of these facts are stated by 
his biographer, and the last with such particularity as to 
show that when he was only eight years of age he was sep- 
arated from his family and placed under Jesuit care, and 
that his education was obtained at the colleges of that society 



PAPAL DEMANDS. 337 

at Viterbo and at Rome. 3 If the world had known, at the 
beginning of his pontificate, how solemnly he had pledged 
himself to his brother cardinals before his election, and how 
his youthful mind had been trained and fashioned by the 
Jesuits, it is not probable that anything would have been 
anticipated, or even hoped for, beyond what has transpired ; 
for the skill of the Jesuits is displayed in nothing more 
effectually than in the indelible impressions they understand 
so well how to make upon young and undeveloped minds. Al- 
though the question to be decided seemed simple enough to 
the general public, both in the United States and in Europe, 
yet to the Jesuits it was of supreme importance; for with 
Church and State separated in Italy, and with Rome as the 
permanent capital of a kingdom independent of the pope 
and submissive to the popular will, their society would be 
crushed by the weight of public odium resting upon them. 
During the progress of the controversy and before the abo- 
lition of the temporal power, Pius IX had been compelled to 
expel them from the States of the Church on account of 
this odium existing in Italy; but tfhey rallied again, with their 
unabated energy, after his successor had been chosen, doubt- 
less realizing how readily a mind trained and disciplined 
under their system of education would yield to their de- 
mands. For a time Leo XIII seemed to be hesitating, as if 
in the issue between liberalism and retrogression there was 
some middle ground. But the Church and the world did 
not have long to wait before the issuance of his first official 
encyclical letter, which put an end to all hopes of reconcilia- 
tion or compromise. In this celebrated document the war 
upon liberalism and progress, as recognized by the modern 
nations, was continued with increased and Jesuitical vio- 
lence — "war to the knife, and the knife to the hilt." There 
was no longer any hesitation or faltering, but the distinct 
avowal of the purpose to revive the papacy, by the restora- 
tion of the temporal power, and to carry on the conflict until 



3 O'Reilly, pp. 52-53. 

2? 



338 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the world shall be turned away from all modern civilization 
and back towards the Middle Ages. His biographer takes 
special pains to make this plain, so that the encyclical may 
be interpreted according to the pope's intention. After 
stating that there were those who expected Leo XIII "to 
devise a modus vivendi with the masters of Rome and Italy," 
and reconcile the Church and the papacy to "modern society 
and its exigencies," he boastingly proclaims that the encyc- 
lical " woefully disappointed all who fancied or hoped that a 
pope could reconcile the revealed truth of which he is the 
divinely-appointed guardian, the righteousness, justice, and 
divine morality which flow from the revealed law of life, 
with the awful errors, the unbridled licentiousness of thought 
and word and deed, the iniquity and the immorality which 
are cloaked over by their pretended civilization."* 

This learned biographer does not intend that the pope's 
encyclical shall be misunderstood ; and when he thus indicates 
the "awful errors," the "unbridled licentiousness," "the in- 
iquity and the immorality," which have been scattered over 
the world by modern progress and civilization — which he char- 
acterizes as "pretended" and not real — he manifestly under- 
stood the mind and motives of the pope, as he also did the 
issue which the papacy has made with all the most enlight- 
ened peoples of the world, and, more especially, with the 
prevailing popular sentiment in the United States. We 
must consequently accept this arraignment of our form of 
civilization as intentionally and deliberately made. And 
that he understood this issue as not confined to Italy alone, 
but as universal in its character, he proceeds immediately to 
show that the pope "speaks with authority to all mankind, 
the light imparted by his teaching illuminates both hemi- 
spheres." 

But this encyclical itself leaves no room to doubt with 
regard to the universality of jurisdiction and authority 
claimed by the pope. Almost at the beginning it announces 



'O'Reilly, p. 328. 



PAPAL DEMANDS. 339 

that he considers himself called upon, by virtue of his spirit- 
ual sovereignty, to decide matters of general import, and not 
merely such as are understood to pertain to the Church of 
Rome or to the people of Italy. Regarding himself as pos- 
sessing this unlimited jurisdiction because he occupies " the 
place of the Prince of Pastors, Jesus Christ," he asserts pon- 
tifical authority over the whole world, in these words: " From 
the very beginning of our pontificate we have had before 
our eyes the sad spectacle of the evils which assail mankind 
from every side." And, accordingly, he makes his purposes 
known by drawing a sad picture of modern society, "im- 
patient of all lawful power," and threatened, in consequence, 
with anarchy and dissolution, on account of its "contempt 
of the laws of morality and justice." All this, to his mind, 
has arisen out of the lawless spirit of revolution which mod- 
ern peoples have invoked to free themselves from the crush- 
ing weight of imperial and absolute monarchism, which he 
proposes to revive in Italy by the re-establishment of the 
temporal power which the people of that country wrested 
from the hands of his immediate predecessor by revolution. 
What we, somewhat triumphantly, call patriotism, liberty, 
and natural right, he denounces as "a pestilential virus 
which creeps into the vital organs and members of human 
society, which allows them no rest, and which forebodes for 
the social order new revolutions ending in calamitous results." 
Against these threatened calamities he felt himself con- 
strained, by virtue of the universality of his spiritual do- 
minion, to warn the world, especially that part of it which 
has voluntarily brought what he considers affliction upon 
itself, by separating Church and State and establishing free- 
dom of religious belief, free speech, a free press, and free 
popular government. He seems to have allowed his mind to 
become disturbed and agitated by this gloomy condition of 
affairs, because it has been produced by the rejection of the 
pope's divine right to regulate whatsoever sentiments and 
opinions he may deem to be within the circle of his spiritual 
jurisdiction. "The cause of all these evils," he says, "lies 



340 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

principally in this : that men have despised and rejected the 
holy and august authority of the Church, which, in the name 
of God, is placed over the human race, and is the avenger 
and protector of all legitimate authority ;" that is, that no 
authority whatsoever, whether of goveruments, peoples, or 
individuals, can be set up against it as rightful or legitimate. 
Then, looking down from this high pinnacle upon the dis- 
turbed and raging elements below, and sorrowing because 
his temporal dominion has been lost, he enumerates some of 
the principal causes which, in his opinion, threaten to wreck 
the happiness and welfare of society. Among these, he 
makes conspicuously prominent the following : Overturning 
the constitution of the Church by laws in force " in most 
countries;" obstacles to the " free exercise of the ecclesiastical 
ministry," which those laws have created ; " the unbridled 
liberty of teaching and publishing all manner of evil ;" de- 
priving the Church of " the right," which he considers irref- 
ragable, to " train and educate the young ;" and, far from 
being least in magnitude or importance, the sacrilegious 
violation of the Divine law by the abolition of the pope's 
temporal power and imperial sovereignty over the Italian 
people. This enumeration was manifestly made, as may be 
implied from the language of his biographer, to enable him 
to point out more clearly to " the Catholic hierarchy" in all 
parts of the world, M toward what purpose their common 
zeal must be chiefly directed ;" that is, what he expects them 
to contribute toward turning the world away from these 
modern innovations upon the papal policy, so that it may be 
carried back to its condition during the Middle Ages, when 
the papal supremacy w T as maintained by the terrible tribunal 
of the Inquisition. That he prefers that period, with its ig- 
norance and superstition, to the present, with its advanced 
enlightenment and prosperity, is plainly and emphatically 
avowed in these words: "If any sensible man in our day 
will compare the age in which we live, so bitterly hostile to 
the religion and Church of Christ, to those blessed ages when 
the Church was honored as a mother of the nations, he will 



PAPAL DEMANDS. 341 

surely find that the society of our day, so convulsed by rev- 
olutions and destructive upheavals, is moving straightway 
and rapidly toward its ruin ; while the society of the former 
ages, when most docile to the rule of the Church and most 
obedient to her laws, was adorned with the noblest institu- 
tions, and enjoyed tranquillity, riches, and prosperity." 5 

This is strange infatuation to be indulged in during the 
nineteenth century, when human energy is taxed to the ut- 
most to give increased velocity to the car of progress, and to 
outstrip all previous ages in placing checks and guards upon 
the ambition of temporal monarchs. It requires but little 
research to learn that the " blessed ages" to which Leo XIII 
refers, and gives such marked preference over the present 
period, were especially distinguished by the ignorance and 
superstition of the multitude. History is crowded with evi- 
dences of this. Maitland — who is highly appreciated and 
often quoted by papal writers on account of his criticisms of 
Robertson, the historian — says that "the ecclesiastics were 
the reading men and the writing men ;" 6 but does not pre- 
tend that such was the case with the peasants or common 
people, as the bulk of the populations were called. There 
is nothing better established than that no facilities for learn- 
ing were afforded them, and that they were kept down at a 
common level of ignorance, so as to reconcile them more 
easily to submission and obedience. This is shown by the 
picture of society drawn by all the early chroniclers, espe- 
cially by Froissart and Monstrelet, as well as by the more 
modern historians, Hallam, Robertson, and Berington. The 
men of learning and letters belonged to the " upper classes," 
for whom alone colleges and schools were provided. The 
people, as such, were left uninstructed, in order to make 
them passively obedient to the authority of Church and State, 
Which were united by ties they were powerless to break. 
They were forced — with but little less severity than was 
shown to the captives of the Pharaohs who built the pyra- 



5 O'Reilly, p. 333. « The Dark Ages. By Maitland. Page 461. 



342 FOOTPRINTS OF TEE JESUITS. 

mids, the temple of Karnak, and other Egyptian monu- 
ments — to serve taskmasters in erecting magnificent palaces, 
cathedrals, and churches, designed for display by those whose 
vanity and pride made them oblivious to the fact that they 
were the product of unrewarded labor, and did not contain 
a stone or marble block not stained by the tears and sweat 
and blood of numberless humiliated victims. But all these 
unrequited victims were ignorant, and therefore obedient — 
obedient, and therefore happy! But Leo XIII, exulting at 
this reflection, instructs the modern nations that the curse of 
God is resting upon their progressive advancement, and that 
he, in Christ's name and place, is divinely empowered to turn 
them back to those " blessed ages," because, if they do not, 
" they must, by corrupting both minds and hearts, drag 
down by their very weight, nations into every crime, ruin 
all order, and at length bring the condition and peace of a 
commonwealth to extreme aud certain destruction." 

To escape these dreadful consequences, and save modern 
society from keeping open the gaping wounds it has inflicted 
upon itself, he makes known his pontifical purpose in these 
words: "We declare that we shall never cease to contend 
for the full obedience to our authority, for the removal of all 
obstacles put in the way of our full and free exercise of our 
ministry and power, and for our restoration to that con- 
dition of things in which the provident design of the Divine 
Wisdom had formerly placed the Roman pontiff." Having 
thus instructed all the faithful that whatsoever prohibits him 
from acquiring all the power and authority "formerly" pos- 
sessed by the popes, must be resisted and put out of the way, 
whether it be constitutions, laws, or customs, he declares to 
them, by way of encouragement, that the world shall have 
no rest until this is accomplished; "not only because the 
civil sovereignty is necessary for the protecting and preserv- 
ing of the full liberty of the spiritual power, but because, 
moreover — a thing in itself evident — whenever there is a 
question of the temporal principality of the Holy See, then 
the interests of the public good and the salvation of the 



PAPAL DEMANDS. 343 

whole of human society are involved." His enthusiasm is 
always heightened, and his eloquence of style becomes capti- 
vating, when his mind displays its power at the contempla- 
tion of that " temporal sovereignty" by which he hopes that 
he and his successors shall bring all mankind within the 
bounds of the pontifical jurisdiction, so that they shall have 
no care for this or a higher life but what is involved in the 
duty of passive and uninquiring obedience. It is when this 
enthusiasm fully possesses him that he seizes upon the occa- 
sion to give the word of command to his ecclesiastical army 
in all parts of the world ; as when he tells them they must 
display their "priestly zeal and pastoral vigilance in kindling 
in the souls of your [their] people the love of our holy re- 
ligion, in order that they may thereby become more closely 
and heartily attached to this chair of truth and justice, ac- 
cept all its teachings with the deepest assent of mind and 
will, and unhesitatingly reject all opinions, even the most wide- 
spread, which they know to be in opposition to the doctrines 
of the Church." 

This instruction is comprehensive enough to include all, 
both priests and laymen. It has the merit of simplicity, re- 
quiring only obedience to the pope, the full " assent of mind 
and will" to all the doctrines he shall announce, and the re- 
jection of "all opinions" in opposition to them; no matter 
if their submission shall involve disobedience to the constitu- 
tions and laws under which they may live. He descends 
also to particulars, and prescribes a course of conduct for all 
his subordinates — like a commanding general laying down 
the plan of a military campaign. They must obtain the con- 
trol of education, so as to "scatter the seeds of heavenly doc- 
trines broadcast," in order to save "the young especially" 
from the deadly influences of State and public schools, where, 
according to his teaching, the method of education "clouds 
their intellect and corrupts their morals." They are re- 
quired to instruct their pupils ' ' in conformity with the Cath- 
olic faith, especially as regards mental philosophy," as taught 
by Thomas Aquinas and "the other teachers of Christian 



344 FOOTPRINTS OF TEE JESUITS. 

wisdom." They are to make exterminating war upon the 
"impious laws" which allow civil marriages, because those 
thus united, " desecrating the holy dignity of marriage, have 
lived in legal concubinage instead of Christian matrimony." 
And lastly, and no less imperatively, all are to be instructed 
in the indispensable obligation "to obey their superiors." 7 

But Leo XIII has not been content with these distinct 
avowals of his pontifical opinions and purposes. He has 
chosen to give emphasis to them in other official methods. 
After the death of Cardinal Franchi, his secretary of state, 
he appointed Cardinal Nina to that place. Whether he 
considered the latter not sufficiently instructed with regard 
to his opinions, or availed himself of the occasion to express 
anew and more explicitly the principles of his pontifical 
policy, there is no means of deciding; but whether the one 
or the other, he addressed to him an official communication, 
wherein these principles were made known with perfect dis- 
tinctness. Still contemplating " the very serious peril of 
society from the ever-increasing disorders which confront us 
on every side," and "the intellectual and moral decay which 
sickens society," in consequence of its having thrown off al- 
legiance to the temporal power of the pope, he arraigns as 
prominent among the existing evils the separation of Church 
and State — precisely that condition of things which exists in 
the United States more distinctively than anywhere in the 
civilized world. Upon this subject — which involves so much 
that is absolutely fundamental in free popular govern- 
ment — he says: "The chief reason of this great moral 
ruin was the openly proclaimed separation aud the at- 
tempted apostasy of the society of our day from Christ and 
his Church, which alone has all the power to repair all the 
evils of society." And referring to the manner in which the 
pope had been "despoiled" of his temporal power, he ad- 
monished him "to consider that the Catholics in the differ- 
ent States can never feel at rest till their supreme pontiff. 



* O'Reilly, pp. 329 to 341. 



Papal demands. 345 

tlie superior teacher of their faith, the moderator of their 
consciences, is in the full enjoyment of a true liberty and a 
real independence ;" that is, that Roman Catholics every- 
where are expected to contribute immediate and active aid 
in bringing about the restoration of the temporal power, so 
that " the progress made by heresy " may be arrested, and 
" heteredox temples and schools" shall be destroyed. 8 

There is nothing in all this, or in anything officially 
done by Leo XIII — howsoever earnestly it may be rejected by 
liberal minds — that should detract in the least degree from 
the estimate in which he deserves to be held by all who ap- 
preciate upright conduct and the consistent observance of 
Christian virtue. For these his life has been eminently 
distinguished, and when its end shall have been reached — 
fears of which are expressed at the time these words are 
written — he will well deserve a lofty niche in the papal mau- 
soleum among the greatest and best of the pontiffs. If his 
opinions and utterances were to be estimated alone by his 
personal integrity and private virtues, the force of any criti- 
cism of them would be materially lessened. But they belong 
to and are an essential part of the papal system which he 
represents and is bound by the necessities of his position to 
maintain against everything in conflict with it. What he 
has said, and so frequently repeated, is echoed back from the 
tombs of those of his predecessors who fought their battles 
with liberalism and progress when the forces which de- 
fended them were weak and the papacy was strong. He 
could not break a single thread in the net which encompasses 
him, howsoever anxiously he might desire it, and is conse- 
quently constrained to carry on the battle waged by his pre- 
decessors until final victory is won or the flag of the temporal 
power is sunk out of sight forever. His task grows harder 
and harder every day; for now the progressive forces are 
growing stronger while the powers of the papacy, lessened 
by the loss of temporal sovereignty, are steadily waning away. 



8 O'Reilly, pp. 344 to 350. 



346 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

He is struggling against the patriotic sentiments of mankind, 
like a strong man battling with the waves of a tempestuous 
sea. Although the light of modern progress is not permitted 
to penetrate the walls of the Vatican, and he is shut in 
behind impenetrable screens especially to keep it out, he 
ought, nevertheless, to know that those to whose prosperity 
and advancement it has contributed are unwilling to acquiesce 
in its extinction, or to sit silently by when it is attempted. 
Whilst his arraignment of civil institutions which have grown 
up within the circle of this light may be well attributed to 
the papal system he officially represents, he has expressed 
his desire for their overthrow in such terms of censure and 
rebuke as to excite the suspicion that he is moved by an un- 
compromising and unconciliatory spirit. "Whatsoever he has 
shown of this may rightfully be assigned to his Jesuit train- 
ing and education. Having been placed under the care of 
that scheming and insinuating society before his opinions 
were matured and whilst his youthful mind was unable to 
detect their sophistry or their cunning, they were enabled to 
mold him to their purposes, as the softened wax is impressed 
by any seal. Any intelligent investigation of his pontifical 
policy, in so far as it involves the relations of the papacy to 
existing civil governments, will demonstrate this to all whose 
faculties have not been dwarfed by the same system of educa- 
tion and guardianship. We see every day, in the natural 
world, conclusive proof that "as the twig is bent so the tree 
is inclined." 



CHAPTER XIX. 

PRESENT ATTITUDE OF THE PAPACY. 

The opinions and utterances of the pope concerning re- 
ligious duty are considered, at least by his army of ecclesi- 
astics, as commands which are to be obeyed at the peril of 
pontifical censure. Among these the learned biographer of 
Leo XIII is a conspicuous example. He not only exhibits his 
own zeal in behalf of the restoration of the temporal power 
in defiance of the expressed will of the Italian people, but 
ventures to speak for the whole body of the Roman Catholic 
population of the United States. With unflagging eloquence 
he says: "For we Catholics from every land, thronging to 
the tomb of the holy apostles and to the home of our com- 
mon father, bear back with us to our own land the memory 
of the humiliation he endures, of the restraints put upon his 
liberty, of the rudeness and insults offered to ourselves ; and 
we resolve that the day shall come when the pope shall be again 
sovereign of Borne" And addressing his appeal to our Prot- 
estant people, he continues: "Even in our own great Re- 
public will not the quick American sense, and the instinctive 
love of justice, and the passion for freedom of conscience, 
soon be made to perceive that the dearest religious rights of 
our millions of Catholics, the dearest interests of civilization 
among the heathen, demand that the pope, the great inter- 
national peacemaking power of the world, should be sovereign 
in the city where he has reigned for eleven hundred years f " * 

This appeal surpasses in extravagance and hyperbole any- 
thing we are accustomed to hear : it would constitute an ad- 
mirable exhibition of word-painting if recited from the ros- 



i Life of Leo XIII. By O'Reilly. Pages 365-366. 

347 



348 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

trum. We, in the United States, have made the toleration 
of all forms of religious belief a fundamental principle of 
our civil institutions, and the present Constitutional Govern- 
ment of Italy, by the abolition of the temporal power of the 
pope, has, in imitation of our example, done the same thing. 
When, before that, did religious toleration exist in Rome ? 
What pope ever gave it the sanction of a papal decree, or 
recognized Protestantism as worthy of anything higher than 
his fiercest anathemas ? Let the millions of persecuted vic- 
tims of pontifical and inquisitorial vengeance — Albigenses, 
Waldenses, Huguenots, and Netherlander — answer from 
their graves. And yet the American people are appealed 
to, because they maintain " freedom of conscience" as insep- 
arable from their national existence, to plot against the pres- 
ent Government of Italy — established by the Italian people 
for themselves — in order to restore the temporal power of 
the pope, so that he may again possess authority to condemn 
this same freedom of conscience as heresy, in order to bring 
about the unification of religious faith throughout the world! 
We attribute our marvelous advancement — which has no 
parallel among the nations — in an essential degree, to the 
separation of Church and State. But Leo XIII has told us 
that because of this we are in rapid decay ; and that unless 
we reunite ourselves with the Holy See of Rome, and obey 
him and his successors — occupying the place of Christ on 
earth — our ultimate ruin is inevitable. What does this rev- 
erend biographer mean when he invokes the aid of our toler- 
ant spirit to re-establish an authority which, for centuries, 
has been exercised in behalf of religious intolerance? Are 
the followers of the pope the only people in the world en- 
titled to freedom of conscience? It is abundantly secured 
to them and all others in the United States and in Italy as 
well. Nevertheless, in the face of this, we are invited to aid 
in restoring the temporal power of the pope in Rome, so 
that he may be empowered to turn back the modern nations 
from their present progress toward the "blessed" Middle 
Ages, and thus secure ultimate triumph to the spirit of relig- 



PRESENT ATTITUDE OF THE PAPACY. 349 

ious intolerance ! Can those guilty of such inconsistencies 
be serious ? Or is their seriousness merely simulated, as 
means to an end ? 

What have we to do with the pope as an international 
peacemaker ? Why does he become so merely by wearing 
the crown of a temporal king in Rome ? There is but one 
answer, which was undoubtedly present in the mind of his 
reverend biographer ; that is, because, by means of his im- 
perial authority as the head of the Church, he may extend 
his spiritual jurisdiction and dominion over such temporal 
affairs in any part of the world as relate to spiritual matters, 
as he at his own will and discretion shall decide. In order 
to understand this we need go no further than to Leo XIII 
himself, whose Jesuit training is easily discernible in all his 
doctrinal teachings. His idea of the temporal power which 
shall give full liberty and independence to his spiritual 
power, is this : that wheresoever, among all the nations, he 
shall consider it necessary to interfere with and direct the 
course of temporal affairs in furtherance of his spiritual duties 
and obligations, he may do so at his own discretion ; and 
where they impede the freedom of his pontifical policy, he 
shall have the divine right to resist or disregard any consti- 
tution, law, or custom which suall stand in his way. To a 
mind like his — with its faculties developed under Jesuit super- 
vision, and filled with the metaphysical subtleties of the Aris- 
totelian philosophy, the sophistries of Thomas Aquinas, and 
the scholasticism of the Middle Ages — this, doubtless, ap- 
pears plain, simple, and conclusive, in so far as his spiritual 
relations to mankind are concerned. It may possibly be 
that he supposes himself not to have mistaken his relations 
to the United States and to the Roman Catholic part of our 
population. This may be, in view of the fact that he can 
have no other but an imperfect knowledge of our form of 
government, our laws, and civil institutions. His learned 
biographer, however, can not shield himself behind this same 
plea of ignorance. As a citizen of the United States he 
must know that any conspiracy formed in this country to pro- 



350 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

cure the restoration of the pope's temporal power in defiance 
of the Constitutional Government of Italy and against the 
expressed will of the Italian people, would violate our neu- 
trality laws as well as the law of nations, be offensive and 
insulting to the kingdom of Italy, a disregard of our treaty 
of amity with that power, and a flagrant cause of war. He 
does not seem moved, or willing to have the papal car ar- 
rested in its course, by any of these considerations, mani- 
festly considering them as mere trifles when weighed iu the 
scale against the triumph of the papacy over popular gov- 
ernment. Ignorance of our institutions may excuse Leo XIII ; 
but a citizen of the United States, whether native or natural- 
ized, should understand better the duties and obligations of 
citizenship. 

When the " Holy Alliance" — as explained in a former 
chapter — conspired to prevent the establishment of popular 
government upon the American Continent and in Europe, 
and to secure the universal triumph of monarchism, the 
President of the United States announced that if these ef- 
forts were extended to the Spanish American States, they 
would be forcibly resisted by the military power of the na- 
tion. It has hitherto been supposed that this met the full 
approval of our people, and that this approval has neither 
been withdrawn nor modified. Yet, in the very face of this, 
we now find ourselves confronted by the proposition — boldly 
and authoritatively made — that a portion of our citizens 
shall organize themselves into a party, uuder religious sanc- 
tion, for the sole purpose of forcing an absolute temporal 
monarch upon the Italian people against their consent, 
thereby upturning the Constitutional Government they have 
established, and placing the United States on the side of the 
" Holy Alliance," and in direct opposition to the popular 
right of self-government ! To say the least, this proposition 
insults the national honor ; and, accompanied as it is by 
the assertion that it involves religious duty, and that every- 
thing contrary to it is heresy, it involves, upon our part, the 
obligation to guard well all the approaches to our popular 



PRESENT A TTIT VDE OF THE PAPA CY. 351 

liberty. It puts the spirit of toleration to a hard trial when 
our "freedom of conscience" is made the shelter for papal 
or other intrigues against itself; and when it is availed of 
as the means of entangling us in alliance with the papal 
temporal power, which, during the thousand years of its ex- 
istence — with exceptions too few to change the general rule — 
has maintained the absolutism of monarchy as a religious 
necessity, and has never ceased its demand for universal 
spiritual sovereignty and dominion. Is it to be forgotten 
that we are living in the nineteenth century, in the foremost 
rank among the advancing nations, and that there are obli- 
gations imposed upon us by that fact we have no right to 
disregard or disobey ? 

An incident is related by his biographer wherein Leo 
XIII indicated the imperiousness of the papacy and his own 
ideas of individual freedom, as well as that of the press. It 
exhibits him in the attitude of denying the right of indi- 
viduals either to entertain or express opinions of their own 
concerning the papacy, its rights, duties, or prerogatives. 
He alone, among all mankind, is divinely endowed with this 
authority; and when his opinions are made known, "every 
knee shall bow" in humble acquiescence and submission. 
This is the kind of faith which prevailed in the Middle Ages, 
and to which we are invited by Leo XIII to return, in order 
to be rescued from the yawning gulf into which the modern 
nations are hastening as punishment divinely inflicted upon 
them for having impiously dared to separate the State from 
the Church ! At the height of papal imperialism it was ex- 
pressed by the saying: " When Rome has spoken, let all the 
world be silent." 

When a little more than a year of the pontificate of Leo 
XIII had passed, "a Congress of Catholic writers and jour- 
nalists" assembled in Rome. They are represented to have 
come " from all countries," with the desire " to take advice 
from the Holy Father on the line of conduct to be followed 
by the Catholic press in treating of politico-religious ques- 
tions," including, of course, the restoration of the pope's 



352 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

temporal power. Whilst, of course, other matters might 
have been included in the conference, that to which it had 
most direct reference was the course which the public press 
should pursue with regard to this great question, which ab- 
sorbed all others ; that is, whether the kingdom of Italy 
should be accepted as an accomplished fact, and the loss of 
the temporal power acquiesced in, or the power of the press 
should be employed to agitate the question of restoration, 
and to demand it as a right divinely established. Those 
present were not all united in opinion. Some " insisted on 
coming to terms with the revolution ;" that is, upon not in- 
volving themselves in traitorous plottings against the Gov- 
ernment of Italy. What was said by these we are not in- 
formed, but whatsoever it was, the pope must have been 
highly incensed, for it is related that he gave them " a se- 
vere rebuke ;" in other words, that he indignantly disap- 
proved of their suggestion. This was done by telling them 
they had no right to entertain individual opinions at all 
upon such a subject, but were bound to obey and execute 
his commands, without the least inquiry whether they ap- 
proved or disapproved them in their own consciences ; that 
is, that they were not allowed to think for themselves, but 
were bound to implicit and submissive obedience to him. 
He expressly told them they " must not presume to decide 
in their own name and by their own light public contro- 
versies of the highest importance bearing on the circum- 
stances of the Apostolic See, nor seem to have opinions in 
opposition to what is required by the dignity and liberty of 
the Roman pontiff." The reason he assigned was the entire 
and absolute sovereignty w T hich the temporal power, added 
to the spiritual, gives the pope over all Governments, peo- 
ples, and opinions, because " there is no power on earth 
which can pretend to be superior or equal to it in the legiti- 
macy of the right and title from which it sprang." 2 

This was a "rebuke" indeed! These writers for the 



2 Life of Leo XIII. By O'Keilly. Page 368, 



PRESENT ATTITUDE OF THE PAPACY. 353 

press must have been seized with consternation at finding 
themselves in the presence of such a sovereign — so august 
and irresponsible. They, doubtless, supposed that duty to 
their own consciences and to the public enjoined upon them 
the obligation to deal fairly and frankly with their patrons, 
by laying before them such opinions as they honestly enter- 
tained, and such reasons in support of them as really existed in 
their own minds. These are the legitimate fruits of the liberty 
of the press, as is shown by the fact that in countries where 
this liberty is maintained, there is no class of people more in- 
dependent than public journalists, or whose views, on that ac- 
count, are more appreciated and influential. It is not stated 
that those who assembled in Rome, " from all countries," to 
seek advice from Leo XIII were of a different class. We 
are told only that to their inquiries he returned "a severe 
rebuke," and commanded them not to "presume to decide in 
their own right and by their own light " anything concern- 
ing the papacy, but to employ their journals in communicat- 
ing to their readers the opinions expressed by himself in such 
manner as not "to seem to have opinions" of their own ! 

Here we are furnished by the present pope himself a 
practical example of what papal sovereignty and dominion 
mean ; that is, the preservation to himself of the right of 
doing and saying whatsoever seems proper in his own eyes, 
and the denial of it to all others. Does anybody need to 
be told whether this is tolerance or intolerance; whether it 
means intellectual liberty or bondage, a free or a muzzled 
press ? This absolute censorship over the press was intended 
to be universal; not only because, in his opinion, what he 
does and says must be so by virtue of the universality of 
his spiritual power, but because he was addressing public 
journalists "from all countries," who were expected to take 
home with them, and obey, his pontifical commands. Un- 
questionably he intended to avow a general principle, alike 
applicable everywhere and to all — whether in Europe or 
America — so that wheresoever a pen of the faithful shall be 
employed in conveying intelligence to the public, "bearing 

23 



354 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

on the circumstances" and condition of the papacy, there is 
but one possible legitimate use to which it can be applied ; 
that is, to announce what the pope does as infallibly right, 
and what he says as infallibly true — censuring and condemn- 
ing all else. He who uses it must not "presume to decide" 
anything or any question for himself, or appeal to his own 
conscience to ascertain its convictions, or "seem to have 
opinions" of his own; but must consider himself as sur- 
rounded by Egyptian darknesss, until a ray of light shall 
break upon him from Rome. Until then he must remain 
deaf to any appeal for information, and " like a lamb, dumb 
before his shearer." This would undoubtedly give to the 
pope the liberty for which he is striving, but it would en- 
slave all others brought within the circle of his spiritual juris- 
diction. 

That which can not escape observation in these opinions 
of the pope, is the extent to which he carries the doctrine 
of papal infallibility. In common acceptation among the 
bulk of Christians who accept the teachings of the Church at 
tlome, that doctrine is regarded as applying only to matters 
concerning religious faith, and not to matters of fact. These 
differ from the Jesuits, who insist that it includes both faith 
and fact ; that is, everything spiritual in its nature, and such 
temporals also as pertain to the spiritual. Leo XIII takes 
the Jesuit ground, for facts would be necessarily mingled 
with faith in the politico-religious matters submitted to him 
by the Congress of editors and writers. When, therefore, he 
commands that all he shall do and say concerning the restora- 
tion of the temporal power and the interests of the papacy, 
shall be accepted as infallibly right and true, not to be called 
in question by any, he conclusively shows the effect of his 
early Jesuit education and training. And since he expects 
all Roman Catholics to accept this doctrine as a necessary 
part of their faith, it is specially important for the people 
of the United States to understand the extent to which he 
expects it to be carried wheresoever his spiritual authority 
shall reach. We are plainly and expressly told that it in- 



PRESENT ATTITUDE OF THE PAPACY. 355 

eludes " politico-religious questions," and this is affirmed by 
him in the incident related by his biographer. The Jesuits 
themselves could say no more, and are careful not to say less 
in their definition of papal infallibility, for fear that some 
inquisitive minds might discover loopholes in the doctrine 
through which individual opinions might escape, and thus 
give approval to liberty of thought, of speech, and of the 
press, and to the forms of popular government which they 
underlie. 

The pope does not intend to be misunderstood, and there- 
fore takes pains not to leave the least doubt with regard to 
his opinions upon the great question of the right of a people 
to establish and maintain a government separated from and 
independent of the Church — as was done by the people of 
the United States when they formed their Government, 
founded upon their own will. He well knows that all gov- 
ernments of this character have been the result and are the 
fruits of the Reformation, and therefore, when he found it 
necessary for him to address a letter to the Archbishop of 
Cologne, touching affairs in Germany, he denounced them 
as "socialistic," or, in other words, as threatening to the 
peace and happiness of society. That he might not be mis- 
apprehended with regard to the character and forms of gov- 
ernment he intended to condemn as of this character, he 
assigned " the sixteenth century " as the period when the 
seeds out* of which they grew were sown, well knowing, as 
all intelligent people do, that the right of the people to gov- 
ern themselves by laws reflective of their will then began to 
take root. That period is specially odious to him on ac- 
count of the results foreshadowed by it, and because he sees 
in it the germs of those measures of public policy which have 
acquired such growth and strength as to undermine the 
pope's temporal power — without which the world seems to 
him to be given over to the dominion of evil. Intending 
therefore to show — what is manifestly a fixed purpose in his 
mind — what he regards as the source of the ills which threaten 
to overwhelm modern society with ruin, he availed himself 



356 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

of the occasion of his episcopal letter to the Archbishop of 
Cologne to say: " Hence, an impious thing never dreamed of 
even by the old pagans, States were formed without any re- 
gard to God or to the order by him established. It was 
given as a dictate of truth that public authority derives from 
God neither its origin, nor its majesty, nor its power to com- 
mand — all that coming, on the contrary, from the multitude ; 
and that the people, deeming themselves free from all divine 
sanctions, consented only to be ruled by such laws as they chose 
to enact." And following these opinions to their logical con- 
sequences, he pictures the condition into which society has 
been thrown by such institutions as the people have created 
for themselves by separating Church and State — as in the 
United States. He thus draws the sad and deplorable picture : 
" By spreading such doctrines far and wide, such an un- 
bridled licentiousness of thought and action was begotten 
everywhere, that it is no wonder if men of the lower classes, 
disgusted with their poverty-stricken homes and their dismal 
workshops, are filled with an inordinate desire to rush upon 
the homes and the fortunes of the w T ealthy ; no wonder is it 
that tranquillity is banished from all public and private life, 
and that the human race seems hurried onward to ruin." 3 

In contemplating the picture of modern prosperity and 
progress — that which is to be found mainly,- if not only, 
where monarchs have been dispensed with or their hands tied 
by constitutional checks and guards — he imagines nothing 
discernible but "unbridled licentiousness of thought and 
action" — nothing but desolation, decay, ruin, death! In 
this way he accounts for his anxiety to regain the temporal 
power which the Italian people took away from Pius IX, so 
that by obtaining perfect liberty for himself as both a spirit- 
Hal and a temporal monarch, he may disperse his ecclesi- 
astical forces throughout the world, and so reform it as to get 
rid entirely of that "impious thing" called popular govern- 
ment, and teach the people that by assuming to make their 



» Life of Leo XIII. By O'Reilly. Pages 371 to 374. 



PRESENT ATTITUDE OF THE PAPACY. 357 

own laws they have reached the borders of a gulf from which 
the papal arm alone can rescue them. Are these utterances 
of Leo XIII to be accepted as infallibly true, as he required 
those to be which he made to the public journalists who went 
all the way to Rome to ask his advice? In both cases the 
questions involved are politico-religious, and as he com- 
manded the latter to have no opinions of their own — nor 
seem to have any — even Jesuit ingenuity and sophistry can 
discover no distinction between them. In the one case as in 
the other his meaning is clear and unmistakable — that these 
matters are all within his spiritual jurisdiction, and that 
whatsoever he has said or may hereafter say concerning them 
must be accepted as expressing the will of God. This con- 
clusion can not be escaped, nor does he intend that it shall 
be; for instead of leaving his meaning to be discovered by 
reading between the lines, it is plain, palpable, and distinct. 
His eloquent biographer does not mistake him. When the 
same questions were discussed by him in an encyclical, and 
the same arguments substantially repeated, this eminent 
divine rapturously affirms that his utterances "were like the 
second promulgation of the law on which rest the founda- 
tions of the moral world." 4 

It thus appears, plainly and palpably, that the modern 
nations are confronted by the fact that the pope has de- 
nounced the making of laws by the people — that is, self- 
government — as an "impious thing," which inevitably leads 
to "unbridled licentiousness of»thought and action," and is 
hurrying the human race "onward to its ruin," 5 and that, 
with his own sanction and pontifical approval, the faithful 



* Life of Leo XIII. By O'Reilly. Page 377. 

6 The preface to the Life of Leo XIII is dated at Rome, where the 
work was submitted to him. His cardinal vicar, in a letter to the 
publishers, says it had "the encouragement, the approbation, and the 
blessing of his holiness," and was prepared "from authentic and au- 
thorized documents, with the concurrence and the direction of persons 
high-placed near the sovereign pontiff." It has also the special ap- 
proval of Cardinal Gibbons. See introductory letters. 



358 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

are instructed to liken his commands upon this- and other 
kindred subjects to the promulgation of the law to Moses in 
the mount! What more important and interesting question 
could be submitted to the modern progressive nations, and 
especially to the United States, than this? It is an arraign- 
ment of the chief fundamental principle of our civil institu- 
tions — a proposition to remove the corner-stone upon which 
our national edifice is resting. Our fathers separated Church 
and State deliberately and wisely, and more than a century 
of experience has assured to us a degree of prosperity un- 
surpassed anywhere in the world. Yet the pope — consider- 
ing this the triumph of evil, of the State over the Church, 
and of Belial over Christ — invites us to come within the circle 
of his spiritual jurisdiction, so that every law of the people 
conflicting with the Canon law of the Roman Church shall 
be blotted from our statute-books, and our limbs bound with 
chains forged in papal workshops. If he could achieve this 
result, he would still admit our right to manage such of our 
affairs as did not conflict with the interests and policy of the 
Church over which he presides; but such as did, he would 
assert the spiritual and divine power to regulate himself. 
He would be content that we should carry on our industrial 
pursuits, sow and harvest our grain, build our houses and 
barns, construct our roads, and pursue our ordinary occupa- 
tions in peace. But he would add tithes to our taxes, deny 
the right of civil marriage, put a stop to the erection of 
Protestant churches, plant hi* pontifical foot upon every form 
of dissenting worship, and demand in the name of religion 
that he should be recognized as both a spiritual and temporal 
monarch over every foot of soil set apart for the uses of the 
Roman Church, and over every devotee of that Church, in so 
far as its interests and necessities should require. And to 
make it sure that all these things should become lasting and 
perpetual, he would close all our school-houses, and turn 
all our teachers adrift, so that the minds of the pupils 
should be molded by Jesuit influence — as his own was — in 
order that the blessed period of the Middle Ages should be 



PRESENT ATTITUDE OF THE PAPACY. 359 

revived, and all memory of the Reformation be blotted out 
forever. 

The pope's biographer, in order to show his readiness for 
the part he has to play in this revolution in our affairs, takes 
occasion to disavow and repudiate, in explicit terms, the 
doctrine of the natural equality of mankind as set forth in 
our Declaration of Independence — seeming to suppose that 
when the proper time shall arrive some modern pope may 
be found who will declare that immortal instrument null and 
void, as Innocent III did the Magna Charta of England. 
He makes his disavowal in these words : " The inequality which 
exists among men living in society arises from nature and its 
Author, just as from Him comes in the magistrate the right 
to rule, and in the subject the duty to obey." 6 

It is not to be supposed that this sounds well in any 
American ears. The author takes advantage of the general 
sentiment that all things have their source in God as their 
author, and assumes from this that because men are differ- 
ently endowed by nature, intellectually and physically, they 
are therefore, by the laws of nature, politically divided into 
a superior and inferior class — the former to rule, and the 
latter to obey. This is the papal theory of society and gov- 
ernment ; but, from the standpoint of modern advancement, 
it will readily be seen that it contains two capital errors : .it 
mistakes social for political inequality, and perpetuates the 
power to rule in one class, and the obligation to obey in the 
other, leaving the latter no chance of changing its condition 
of inferiority and submissiveness. It fails to observe that 
what men do in social intercourse is one thing, and concerns 
themselves and immediate associates only; whereas, what 
they shall do in civil and political intercourse is another 
thing, and concerns the community of which they are mem- 
bers. It does not follow, because they do not in their inter- 
course with each other enjoy social equality, that they should 
not share alike in political equality, in order thereby to pro- 



6 Life of Leo XIII. By O'Reilly. Page 378. 



360 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

mote the welfare of all. The contrary is far more reasonable 
and just — that civil and political equality shall prevail, in 
order that the whole of society may be brought, as nearly 
as possible, to the common ground of social equality; that is, 
that the opportunities for equality should be open to all. 
This is the progressive theory of government. But the 
papal and retrogressive theory, as set forth by Leo XIII 
and his biographer, is opposed to this, for the reason al- 
leged by the latter that God and nature established " in- 
equality," in order that the right of the superior class to 
govern, and the obligation of the inferior class to obey, shall 
remain perpetual. This fallacy was successfully maintained 
during the Middle Ages, and so long as Church and State 
remained united, because monarchism possessed sufficient 
power to enable the ruling class to hold the multitude in 
inferiority. But as the example of Christ, during his human- 
ity, demonstrated that men could lead pious and Christian 
lives without regard to the character of the governments 
which ruled over them ; that, in fact, civil governments can 
have no rightful authority over internal religious convic- 
tions — the influence of that example opened, through the 
Reformation, the way to such enlightenment as pointed out 
the necessity for return to primitive Christianity, in order to 
fit communities, organized as States, for equality of rights 
under governments of their own in so far as all things per- 
taining to their general welfare were concerned. This equal- 
ity is not confined to aggregated communities alone, but 
extends to the individuals composing them in all matters 
not relating to the good of the whole. Among these, made 
prominently conspicuous under the civil institutions of the 
United States, is the natural right of each individual to wor- 
ship God as his own conscience shall dictate, without inter- 
ference from any quarter, so that by enlightenment he may 
realize the full sense of his own personality, and thereby in- 
crease his ability to add to the common stock of prosperity. 
Experience has shown that this could be accomplished in no 
other way than by disuniting Church and State; and there- 



PRESENT ATTITUDE OF THE PAPACY. 361 

fore we, in this country, are well assured that the framers 
of our Government acted wisely in doing this, by assigning 
to the former the spiritual, and to the latter the temporal 
sphere, as was the case during the lives of Christ and the 
apostles. In furtherance of this end it became necessary 
that our Declaration of Independence should establish the 
proposition, as a fundamental principle, that all men are en- 
titled, by the law of nature, to perfect equality of rights, 
and while our sense of security may lead us to bear with 
some degree of patience the papal censure of this principle, 
they are mistaken who argue therefrom that we can be per- 
suaded, upon any conditions, to exchange that principle for 
one involving civil and political inequality, which the papacy 
recommends to us as alone in conformity to the divine law 
as the pope interprets it. 

When the pope tells us that " unbridled licentiousness of 
thought and action" results from governments by the people, 
and that thereby " tranquillity is banished from all public and 
private life," and " the human race seems hurried on to 
ruin," he manifestly allows his zeal to outstrip his discretion. 
This arises out of his position, as well as the desire to regain 
the temporal power lost by his predecessor. He overlooks 
the fact that the most prosperous among existing nations are 
those where Church and State have been separated, and 
clings to the idea that he can not be reconciled to this pros- 
perity without violating the divine command. One reason he 
assigns for this belief is that the "licentiousness of thought 
and action" which he considers the outgrowth of civil insti- 
tutions responsive to the will of the people — where Church 
and State are separated — has excited the "lower classes" by 
the "inordinate desire to rush upon the homes and the for- 
tunes of the wealthy." He certainly did not desire to be 
understood as intending to incite these "lower classes" into 
anarchy; but careful reflection would have enabled him to 
see that by announcing to them that those who have separated 
Church and State, and constructed popular governments, 
have sinned by breaking the divine law, he furnished to these 



362 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

''lower classes" who are obedient to his teaching, an argu- 
ment by which many of them would readily justify themselves 
for rushing "upon the homes and fortunes of the wealthy." 
If disobedience to the papal decrees is heresy, as multitudes 
of popes and ecclesiastics have declared ; if heresy may be 
lawfully suppressed by the extermination of heretics, as Inno- 
cent III instructed the faithful, and the Council of Constance 
decreed; if dissension from the faith of the Roman Church 
has the curse of God resting upon it, as Leo XIII has him- 
self affirmed, there are those of these "lower classes" ready 
to become the avengers of the divine wrath by rushing 
"upon the homes and fortunes of the wealthy," under the 
pretext that they are wrongfully deprived of their rightful 
share of property, which God designed for the common uses 
of mankind. It is said that there are bandits not far from 
Rome who follow the capture of their victims by crossing 
themselves before the image of Mary ; and while Leo XIII 
has no sympathy with these, and would readily aid in pun- 
ishing them as outlaws, yet he can not fail to realize, in his 
calmer moments, that when he expresses "no wonder" at 
their acts of outlawry, because they are perpetrated upon 
those who are guilty of " unbridled licentiousness" and the 
sin of heresy, he suggests to them a pretext of which they 
are not slow to avail themselves. Manifestly he has suffered 
himself — like many other good and Christian men — to go 
too far. 

The danger lies in the excess into which the pope and 
others who are intent upon the restoration of his temporal 
power, are betrayed by the peculiar conditions surrounding 
them. There can be no denial of the fact that this is a 
politico-religious question, and there is no attempt to deny it. 
Politically it involves the conversion of the pope into a king 
over the Italian people, not only without their consent, but 
against their protest. There can be no* question more im- 
portant to any people than this; for it directly involves their 
right to be free, independent, and self-governing. But it is 
made to assume a religious aspect by reason of the fact that 



PRESENT ATTITUDE OF THE PAPACY. 363 

the pope and his followers assume it to be a necessary part 
of the divine plan that the head of the Church shall be — 
whether the people of Italy consent or not — an absolute 
temporal monarch in Home. This they make an essential 
part of religious belief, and everything contrary to it heret- 
ical. Consequently, whatsoever institutions recognize the 
right of the people to make their own laws and select their 
own agents to administer them, are placed under the ban of 
the papacy. This brings the papacy in conflict with all the 
modern nations which have separated the State from the 
Church ; and as the pope can not maintain the papal theory 
without arraigning them as violators of the divine law, he 
can not avoid excesses without seeming to abandon, in some 
degree, his claim to temporal power. This politico-religion 
directly assails one of the fundamental principles of our 
Government, and the effort to induce any part of our popu- 
lation to accept it as religious faith, necessarily antagonizes 
the Government itself; for, although the question primarily 
and practically concerns the Italian people alone, the growth 
of this sentiment in this country could have no other ten- 
dency than to threaten our popular institutions and the right 
of self-government with ultimate overthrow. In the very 
face of this, the biographer of Leo XIII, and undoubtedly 
reflecting his sentiments, ventures to refer to the present 
Constitutional Government of Italy, in these words: " The 
occupation of Rome is an international wrong, which all 
Catholics are bound to denounce and oppose until it is done 
away with." 7 

This language is express, direct, emphatic. There is not 
the least obscurity about its meaning ; and having the ap- 
proval of the pope and of his American cardinal, together 
with his official blessing, it is undoubtedly intended to in- 
struct every Roman Catholic in the United States that he 
shall treat the loss of the temporal power as an international 
question; and that the whole body of the faithful shall organ- 



» O'Reilly, p. 471. 



364 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

ize themselves into a politico-religious party, to bring the 
Government to interfere for its restoration ; and not to cease 
the agitation, no matter what consequences shall follow, until 
this shall be accomplished. This is a serious matter — too 
serious to be passed by idly or inconsiderately. The resto- 
ration of the pope's temporal power is exclusively a foreign 
question, because it involves alone the question how a foreign 
people shall govern their own domestic affairs; whether, in 
other words, they shall govern themselves or have a king 
forced upon them, with absolute imperial power in his hands, to 
govern them at his own will and without their consent, as their 
ancestors were governed during the Middle Ages, and them- 
selves also, until, imitating the example set them by the 
people of the United States, they grasped the scepter of gov- 
ernment in their own hands by a patriotic and successful rev- 
olution. The Government of the United States has neither 
the right nor the power to interfere, any more than it has 
the right and power to dictate the successor to the throne of 
England upon the death of Queen Victoria, or who shall be 
the pope of Rome when Leo XIII shall die. Besides, by the 
separation of Church and State, this country can not have, 
by legal sanction, any politico-religious questions to agitate 
and disturb the nation, and put its peace in peril. This had 
been sufficiently done throughout the world before our in- 
stitutions were formed, and to guard against its repetition 
here, our fathers properly and wisely excluded all such mat- 
ters from the domain of American politics. The attempt to 
introduce them now can have but one meaning — the desire 
to^ unsettle the work so wisely done and thus far so patriot- 
ically maintained. 

We must not permit the pope or his apologists to mislead 
us by the pretense that they do not propose to interfere with 
purely political questions, as they understand them. If de- 
ceived themselves upon this point, we should be careful not 
to be deceived by them; for it requires but little intelligence 
to foresee the evil consequences that would inevitably follow 
the introduction of politico-religious questions among us, espe- 



PRESENT ATTITUDE OF THE PAPACY. 365 

cially such as tend to involve us in dangerous controversy 
with a foreign and friendly power. It would, beyond any 
reasonable doubt, lead to the formation of a politico-religious 
party, and incite tremendous and threatening commotion. 
The people would then be required to re-decide questions 
long since settled, as they supposed, finally. Such a contro- 
versy could have but one end, which might, however, have 
to be reached through turmoil and strife, if not tribulation ; 
for the people would not be likely to decide themselves in- 
competent for self-government, or to acquiesce in the pope's 
jurisdiction over the fundamental principles of their Govern- 
ment, or to see their own authority so narrowed as to em- 
brace only the administration of local and inferior affairs. 
If this battle is to be now fought, it has not been invited by 
the people of the United States. They are satisfied with 
the fundamental principles of their institutions as they are, 
and those will find themselves mistaken who shall endeavor 
to make their tolerance the fulcrum upon which the papal 
lever may rest, in order that they may be carried back to 
those " blessed ages " when unquestioning obedience to the 
pope, upon whatsoever subject he chose to embrace within 
his spiritual jurisdiction, was considered the highest duty of 
citizenship and the only road to heaven. 



CHAPTER XX. 

THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 

No injustice should be done to Leo XIII. If his posi- 
tion as the official head of a great Church were not sufficient 
to shield him against unfairness, his eminent Christian vir- 
tues should do so. Before his election to the pontificate he 
had acquired the reputation of being conspicuously great. 
He was, undoubtedly, the ablest defender of the prerogative 
rights of the papacy among the entire body of cardinals; 
and this distinction was well deserved. His arguments were 
then addressed mainly to ecclesiastics, and were designed to 
encourage them in their efforts to extinguish the revolution- 
ary spirit which pervaded the Roman Catholic populations 
of Europe. 

Now that he has become pope, the circle of his influence 
is enlarged so that it reaches the whole body of the Church 
of Rome through the medium of his hierarchy and priest- 
hood ; of whom it may rightfully be said, without intending 
offense, that they have no other spiritual work to do but 
what he assigns to them. That they may be fitted for this 
they have been deprived of all share in the responsibilities 
which pertain to the conduct of human affairs — all par- 
ticipation in the active operations of society and all those 
domestic associations which excite generous and kindly emo- 
tions and give to life its greatest charm. They are, conse- 
quently, molded by him into a compact organization, held 
in cohesion by the power of a common purpose, with the 
special design of assailing, in every part of the world, what- 
soever he shall decide to be^ under the ban of his pontifical 
displeasure. With such a force at his command — unitedly 
resisting what he shall direct them to resist, and defending 
366 



THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 367 

what he shall direct them to defend — he constitutes such a 
power in the presence of the nations as exists nowhere else. 
Reaching, therefore, vaster multitudes of people, and pos- 
sessing more potential influence than any other man in the 
world, nothing should be permitted to impair our obligation 
to become acquainted with his present pontifical opinions 
and purposes, as well as with the habits of thought whicJi 
prepared him for his present eminent position. It cau not 
be rightfully complained that his pontifical opinions are in- 
terpreted in the light of those previously entertained and ex- 
pressed by him — more especially since his biographer has 
made such liberal use of them to prove his fitness to become 
the potential head of the Christian world. 

While cardinal, he availed himself of frequent opportu- 
nities to denounce the Italian Revolution as sinful, and sup- 
ported all the measures designed to suppress it. He aided 
Pius IX by his advice and counsel, and defended the entire 
series of his pontifical measures — condemning as heresy every 
professed form of Christianity that did not recognize the 
obligation of obedience to the pope as a divinely-appointed 
temporal sovereign. He regarded all other Churches besides 
the Roman as impiously pretentious — having no legitimate 
right to exist — and consequently as under the Divine dis- 
pleasure. As he considered unity of Christian faith essential 
to the unity of the Church, and the temporal dominion of 
the pope as absolutely necessary to both, he employed much 
of his time as cardinal in supplying the clergy of Perugia with 
arguments against the revolution, and in pointing out both 
its spiritual and temporal consequences. As part of his pas- 
toral work he insisted that the destruction of the temporal 
power of the pope would necessarily and inevitably lead to 
infidelity and atheism, because it would open the door to the 
toleration of other religions besides the Roman. This, in 
his opinion, would inaugurate the reign of "irreligion and 
libertinism," for the reason that there was no middle state be- 
tween obedience to the pope as an absolute temporal mon- 
arch, with complete authority over the faith and consciences 



368 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

of his subjects, and the ruin of society. He divided society into 
two classes : one faithful to Christ, and therefore obedient to 
the pope; and the other representing Belial — that is, Satan — 
because of the refusal of that obedience. Upon all these 
points his meaning was plainly expressed in eloquent and 
faultless style. 

Although differing from Pius IX with regard to the dura- 
tion of the temporal power — fixing it at "eleven centuries," 
and not as obtained at the fall of the Roman Empire, several 
hundred years previously — he, nevertheless, considers it a 
"divine institution," conferring upon the popethe "supreme 
and governing power in spirituals." Before explaining, 
however, what he intends by "spirituals," he insists that 
whatsoever they are, they can not become subject to any 
human interference or limitation in any part of the world, 
but must be everywhere complete and plenary. Upon this 
point his biographer assumes to assist him, by interjecting 
between his sentences, as a key to his meaning, the idea that 
the temporal power is "incarnate in a manner in the Roman 
pontiff;" £}iat is, that in some strangely mysterious way, it 
so permeates tfre pope as to be made providentially insepa- 
rable from his personal as well as official existence ! But, 
seeming not to realize the ridiculousness of his bold hyper- 
bole, he omits to explain why this same power was not in- 
carnate in the popes before they placed crowns upon their 
own heads at the fall of the Roman Empire. Perhaps he 
imagined that the incarnate principle was in its germ during 
the first ages of the Church, and that the process of its de- 
velopment into absolute imperialism was not complete until 
the peaceful alliance between the Eastern and the Western 
Christians was sundered by the invading armies of Pepin and 
Charlemagne, when these sovereigns imparted a portion of 
their royal prerogatives to the popes and protected them by 
military force. Whatsoever meaning may have been in- 
tended, it is manifestly designed to convey and enforce the 
sentiment as part of the doctrinal faith of the Church, that 
because the temporal power "maintains in their unity and 



THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 369 

integrity the Church and religion," therefore it is divine, and 
confers superhuman authority upon the pope over the senti- 
ments, opinions, and conduct of mankind. "Besides," said 
Leo XIII, while yet Cardinal Pecci, "can it be intelligible 
that the living interpreter of the divine law and will should 
be placed under the jurisdiction of the civil authority, which 
itself derives its own strength and authority from the same 
will and law?" To this question he attempts no specific 
answer, but his meaning was well understood by those to 
whom it was addressed ; that is, by the ecclesiastics whose 
minds had been molded by the same training as his own. 
It is this : That as the authority of the pope and that of the 
State are both derived from the same divine law, and as the 
pope alone is the "living interpreter" of that law, therefore 
the State must accept and obey what he shall declare as " the 
voice of God." Continuing, however, he embraces this same 
meaning in equally expressive terms. Happiness in this life 
he considers the only means of procuring higher happiness 
hereafter, and therefore the pope as "high priest" has "re- 
ceived from Christ the mission of guiding humanity toward 
the everlasting felicity ;" that is, there is no other true re- 
ligion than that announced and maintained by the pope; 
that all other forms are false and heretical ; and that those 
who do not profess it will, in the great and unknown future, 
be cast into utter darkness, to weep and wail and gnash their 
teeth forever. And then, basing his conclusion upon this 
hypothesis, he breaks out in this ejaculation: "See, then, 
what upsetting of ideas it would be to make the high priest 
of the Catholic Church, the Roman pontiff, the subject of 
any earthly power ;" as if God had so endowed all the popes — 
even Alexander VI (!) — with the faculty of inerrancy, 
that they alone, of all the ages, have had the mysteries of 
nature and revelation revealed to them ! He never permits 
this idea of universal papal sovereignty to escape him with- 
out so expressing its meaning as to show that wheresoever or 
into whatsoever country he shall assert it, it can not become 
subject to any other law than that which the pope himself 

24 



370 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

shall prescribe. It requires but little scrutiny to see that 
what he intends is, that when the pope sends his ecclesiastical 
representatives into any part of the world, his instructions 
must be to them a code of laws which they must obey at 
every hazard, although it may become necessary to violate 
whatsoever conflicting laws the civil authorities may enact. 
If the people of the United States were to submit to this, 
from the moment they should do so they would cease to 
exist as an independent nation, and their progressive pros- 
perity would wither and die under the spiritual tyranny of 
papal Home, as other republics have hitherto withered and 
died under the temporal tyranny of imperial Rome. And 
thus that ancient city which, by its iniquities, became the 
Babylon of the apostolic times, would again acquire the 
power to rebuild by unrewarded labor the monuments upon 
her seven hills, and to exult at the decay of the present pro- 
gressive nations, as her great prototype did when she looked 
out upon the miserable but obedient populations who swarmed 
throughout the valleys of the Tiber. 

Leo XIII lays down his premise with such assumed au- 
thority as not to admit of challenge, and logically argues 
from it certain satisfactory conclusions, without pausing to 
inquire whether the premise itself is true or false. In this 
respect he imitates some logicians who seem" not to realize 
the difference between assumption and proof. For example, 
he insists that Christ established an independent Church 
and a dependent State, so that the former does not exist in 
the latter, but the latter must exist in the former, in its con- 
dition of dependence. He overlooks the fact that States ex- 
isted before the Church, and that instead of interfering with 
their temporal affairs Christ paid tribute to them, and recog- 
nized the independence of each in its own proper sphere — 
the one spiritual and the other temporal. The spiritual 
obedience he exacted was to the divine law, in order to pro- 
mote the spiritual welfare of individuals and consequently of 
society ; the temporal obedience was to make secure the 
political rights of citizenship, including those of person and 



THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 37i 

property. He did not consider States as capable of rewards 
and punishment in another life, but as mere aggregated 
communities who could bring them to an end by abandoning 
their territories. Therefore, he left the State to its own 
temporal government, independently of the Church, and not 
only obeyed its laws himself, but enjoined the obligation of 
the same obedience upon his disciples and followers ; that is, 
of rendering "unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's." He 
gave equal independence to the Church, so that by administer- 
ing to the spiritual welfare of individuals the temporal wel- 
fare of the State would be advanced and the common pros- 
perity the better secured. And thus, by also rendering 
" unto God the things that are God's," the general welfare of 
the State wouM rest upon firmer foundations. 

History, during all the ages since Christ, well attests the 
character of his plan. For more than five hundred years the 
Church and the State acted independently of each other, 
neither encroaching upon the sphere of the other, and Chris- 
tianity progressed until paganism disappeared before it. 
When the pmbitious popes brought on a conflict that sepa- 
rated the Western from the Eastern Christians, and accepted 
the crown of temporal dominion from Pepin and Charle- 
magne in consideration of the pontifical ratification of the 
former's treason to France, the world was plunged into the 
darkness and stupor of the Middle Ages, and they became 
enabled to employ their power of absolute monarchism to 
compel obedience from the State to the Church and the In- 
quisition, to produce unity of religious faith. When the 
cloud of popular ignorance became so dense as to be scarcely 
penetrable, and such popes as Alexander VI could assert 
their own infallibility with impudent impunity, and burn at 
the stake those who denied it, the necessity for reform became 
so urgent that the period of the Reformation was ushered in 
with such violence that the papacy, aided by the Jesuits, was 
powerless to arrest it. And when the Reformation gave 
birth to Protestantism, and enabled it to culminate, through 
the influence of free religious thought, in the civil institu- 



372 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

tions of the United States, such impetus was given to the 
liberalizing spirit of progress that monarchism in both Church 
and State would be hastened to its final decay, were it not 
that Leo XIII has thrown the great weight of his Christian 
character into the scale in favor of it and against the pro- 
gressive spirit which has advanced the world to its present 
condition of prosperity and happiness. Those who advise us 
to turn back from this prosperity and happiness toward the 
Middle Ages, under the pretense that they are produced by 
the triumph of irreligion and licentiousness over Christianity, 
are, to say the least, counselors of evil. 

Leo XIII reasons within a narrow circle ; or, rather, 
within a number of circles, reaching always the same con- 
clusion, that whatsoever is adverse to the papacy must be op- 
posed until it is put out of the way. His spiritual power 
must be as comprehensive as he desires to make it — includ- 
ing whatsoever of temporals he shall decide necessary to its 
free exercise, or to the interests of the Church ; and within 
this circle his jurisdiction must be so full, complete, and in- 
dependent, that neither Governments nor communities nor 
individuals can place any limitation upon it, or violate the 
rules and principles he shall prescribe, without heresy. He 
is always explicit upon questions concerning the relations be- 
tween the pope and Governments — never losing sight of the 
idea that he must be absolutely independent of them ; so 
much so that while they must obey him when he shall think 
proper, in behalf of the Church and religion, to command 
their obedience, he shall be under no obligation to obey any 
of their laws which he shall consider in conflict with his 
pontifical plans or the interests of the Church. " He must 
be free," he says, " to communicate without impediment with 
bishops, sovereigns, subjects, in order that his word, the organ 
and expression of the divine will, may have a free course all 
over the earth, and be there canonically announced." Here, 
again, he gives prominence to the idea that he is the only 
interpreter of the divine will, coupling with it the additional 
one, that not only bishops, but sovereigns and peoples every- 



THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 373 

where, must recognize and obey it ; for obedience is neces- 
sarily implied, inasmuch as his commands would not have 
" free course" without it. No Government must possess the 
power to prohibit this, because he acts canon ically ; that is, 
his decrees, being an embodiment of the divine will, become 
part of the Canon law, which, having thus the stamp of di- 
vinity upon it, must be universally recognized and obeyed, 
no matter what Governments may do or say to the contrary. 
Practically it is the same as if he had said that the laws of 
all the Governments, touching matters embraced within his 
pontifical jurisdiction, must give way to the Canon law, be- 
cause they are human and it is divine. 

There are many methods of illustrating the effect of this 
papal doctrine which will occur to intelligent minds; but at 
this point one is sufficient. In the United States we have 
separated Church and State, and based our civil govern- 
ment upon the principle of toleration for differences of re- 
ligious faith. But by papal decrees and the Canon law all 
this is declared to be heresy, and placed under the pontifical 
ban. Hence, the sovereign spiritual power claimed by Leo 
XIII, as pope, gives him the divine right, in the face of all 
our Constitutions, National and State, to anathematize the 
heretical form of our institutions, and to impose upon all 
who recognize obedience to him the obligation to oppose this 
heresy, and to eradicate it whensoever it is expedient to un- 
dertake it. Involved in this there is, also, the claim of ad- 
ditional power to reconstruct our Government so as to unite 
Church and State, and subordinate the latter to the former, 
by putting an end to all religious differences, and establish- 
ing the religion of the pope — whatever that is or may be — 
as the national religion. 

But Cardinal Pecci — now Leo XIII — expressed himself 
more plainly and emphatically upon these points, in assign- 
ing the reasons why the pope should possess, and exercise 
throughout the world, this extraordinary spiritual sovereignty. 
It is necessary, he said, in order that the pope may be em- 
powered " to keep off schism; to prevent the spread of pub- 



374 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

lie heresies; to decide religious disputes; to speak freely to 
rulers and peoples; to send nuncios and ambassadors; to con- 
clude concordats ; to employ censures ; to regulate, in fact, 
the consciences of two hundred millions of Catholics scat- 
tered all over the earth ; to preserve inviolate dogmas and 
morals; to receive appeals from all parts of the Christian 
world; to judge the causes thus submitted; to enforce the 
execution of the sentences pronounced ; to fulfill, in one 
word, all his duties, and to maintain all the sacred rights of 
his primacy." 

Having thus enumerated these extraordinary powers of 
the pope — such as exist nowhere else in the world — he goes 
a step further by defining the relations between the papacy 
and those Governments and peoples that have taken away, 
or refused to recognize, the existence of these powers. In 
this he refers, primarily, to the kingdom of Italy, which had 
committed the offense of abolishing the temporal power of 
the pope and separated Church and State ; and, secondarily, 
to all other Governments throughout the world where the 
union between Church and State is forbidden; that is, where 
Governments of, and for, and by the people have been es- 
tablished. " Here, then," says he, " is what they are aiming 
at by taking from the pope his temporal power : they mean 
to render it impossible for him to exercise his spiritual power." 
This goes to the bottom of the question, and states plainly 
the idea present in his mind ; that is, that the spiritual power, 
being superior to the temporal, necessarily includes it to the 
extent he shall think proper to assert — limited only by his 
pontifical disoretion — so that the latter must to that extent 
be kept in subordination to the former, and obey its com- 
mands. For example, the pope considers it his duty to send 
an army of ecclesiastics to all parts of the world, and to 
exact from them implicit obedience to himself, so that where- 
soever they shall find temporal laws forbidding them to per- 
form their spiritual functions as he shall define them, he and 
they must be endowed with sufficient spiritual power to en- 
able them to disobey those laws and set them aside when it 



THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 375 

becomes expedient to do so. He assumes that " every Cath- 
olic " — no matter where he is — accepts this as part of his re- 
ligious faith, being instructed that the pope must possess 
such power over both spirituals and temporals as shall make 
him independent of every Government upon earth in all 
such matters as he shall declare to be within his spiritual 
jurisdiction. Quoting some obscure " lodge of Carbonarism 
in Italy," in order to show that where the pope does not pos- 
sess the power he claims for him, irreligion, infidelity, and 
immorality must, of necessity, prevail, he declares that " it 
is no longer matter of policy ; it is matter of conscience" to 
remove out of the way all impediments to papal supremacy, 
and that every Christian must stand by the pope in order to 
put down the enemies of religion, who are designated by him 
to 'be those who have taken away from the pope or deny to 
him any or all of the above enumerated powers. 

He does not fail to make his denunciation as compre- 
hensive and sweeping as possible, by characterizing as " irre- 
ligion and libertinism " the progressive advancement of mod- 
ern nations, which prevails where Church and State have 
been separated. He attaches this character to all these, be- 
cause, according to him, they are not faithful to Christ, or 
the Church, or the pope. He denounces the revolution in 
Italy as " the result of conspiracy, deception, injustice, and 
sacrilege," merely because it abolished the temporal power of 
the pope, without the least impairment of any single prin- 
ciple of religious faith that can be traced back to Christ, to 
the apostles, or to the primitive Christians. What seemed 
to him to be one of its deplorable and most odious conse- 
quences was the loss of power by the pope in consequence of 
the provision which placed the clergy upon equality with 
other citizens in regard to civil duties and rights, and made 
them responsible to the laws of the State, precisely as they 
are in the United States. This is a point upon which neither 
the pope nor the clergy will compromise, otherwise than 
upon compulsion. With them there is no heresy more fla- 
grant than compelling the clergy to comply with any law 



376 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

requiring them to do what the pope forbids as prejudicial to 
the Church. The right of the pope to require of them dis- 
obedience to any such law, and their right to disobey it, is 
what they call independence, which, according to them, can 
not be impaired without violating the divine law. They 
submit to this in the United States, and wheresoever Church 
and State are separated, but always with the unchangeable 
purpose of securing, in the end, complete triumph for the 
law of the Church over that of the State. Hence, when, as 
the result of the revolution, the law of Umbria placed the 
clergy upon an equality with other citizens, and made them 
responsible to the laws of the State, as they now are in the 
United States, it was denounced by the present occupant of 
the papal chair as a sacrilegious violation of the divine law. 
Is this requirement any less "sacrilege" in the United States 
than in Umbria ? The degrees of latitude and longitude do 
not vary the meaning of the divine law; but the difference 
in conditions may account for simulated acquiescence in the 
one case and open protest in the other. 

He saw also, in the " diffusion of pestilential books, of 
erroneous doctrines, and heterodox teachings " another cause 
for the pontifical curse, inasmuch as it impaired the power 
of the pope to place restrictious upon the freedom of the 
press, which has opened the way to liberalism -and made the 
crowns of kings insecure. But that which he condemned 
more than all, and considered the source of innumerable ills, 
was the fact that Church and State were separated, aud each 
confined to its own distinct and independent sphere. Refer- 
ring to the law of Umbria which required the clergy to ac- 
cept this — as the clergy in the United States are required to 
accept it — he said : " They are offered, as the basis of recon- 
ciliation, to accept tlie condemned and false system of the sep- 
aration of Church and State, which, being equivalent to divorc- 
ing the State from the Church, would forqe Catholic society 
to free itself from all religious influence. He manifestly 
intended to impress the minds of all who acknowledged obe- 
dience to the pope, whether in Europe, the United States, 



THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 377 

or elsewhere, with the sentiment that the only true religion 
in the world required, as a matter of faith, that Church and 
State should be united, with the latter subordinate to the 
former in whatsoever concerns faith and morals, and that 
where they have been separated their union should be re- 
stored. Having thus made this the solemn religious duty of 
"every Catholic" throughout the world, he has thereby 
placed himself, and*is preparing them to be placed when the 
proper time shall arrive, in direct hostility to the principles 
which prevail in all modern liberal Governments, including 
that of the United States. 1 

In all this there is no disguise — nothing equivocal. Nor 
is there any reason why there should have been, inasmuch 
as these admonitions were addressed to a population reared 
and educated in the faith of the Church at Kome, for cen- 
turies obedient to the commands of the pope and his clergy, 
and in whose minds there was supposed to linger such senti- 
ments of reverence for the papacy as would, if vigorously 
appealed to, stimulate them to demand the restoration of the 
temporal power. Therefore, the foremost man among the 
clergy — he whose eloquence stirred the heart and whose vir- 
tues were universally acknowledged — was chosen as the 
champion of the papal cause. But for events which have 
subsequently occurred — more especially his election to the 
pontificate — and the tolerant spirit which pervades our insti- 
tutions, it is not probable they would ever have reached the 
people of the United States. And even now, since they have 
done so in the pope's biography, there are scarcely five out 
of every hundred thousand of our population who will ever 
read them, or, if they do, will turn aside from the multitude 
of their pursuits to investigate and scan them closely enough 
to discover their true meaning, plainly and fairly as it is ex- 
pressed. By such investigation and discovery they would see 
that Leo XIII considers the following propositions irrevo- 
cably settled as religious dogmas : That God provided for the 



i Life.of Leo XIII. By O'Keilly. Pages 200-214. 



378 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

Italian people a form of civil government subject to the ab- 
solute dominion of tlie pope, as the only one that can be re- 
ligiously tolerated ; that revolution to set it aside and estab- 
lish a popular and constitutional form of government in its 
place, violates the law of God, and is heresy ; that self-gov- 
ernment by the people is an abomination which can never 
obtain the sanction and approbation of the papacy ; and 
that the people of Italy, in order to remain faithful to the 
Church, should continue forever obedient subjects of this 
imperial absolutism, no matter how severe its oppressions may 
become, or how much they may desire to rid themselves and 
their children of it. And it will be observed that the con- 
dition of Italy, in rebellion against the temporal absolutism 
of the pope, serves him to illustrate the principle which lies 
at the bottom of all his reasoning ; that as God governs the 
world in equity, and has provided this imperial absolutism 
for that purpose, with the pope to preside over all that is 
spiritual and whatsoever temporals shall involve spirituals, 
therefore all other forms of government are founded upon 
" irreligion and libertinism," especially such as make the 
whole body of the people the source of civil power. 

The integrity of Leo XIII is not questioned by any one. 
But he might be liable to the suspicion of insincerity if he 
had been personally enabled to contrast the present improved 
condition of the people of the United States, which has been 
reached within little more than a century of time, with that 
of the peoples who have for more than twelve hundred years 
been compelled to submit to the authority and spiritual do- 
minion of the papacy. At all events, it is difficult, for 
minds impressed by the influences of free popular govern- 
ment, to appreciate either the force or merits of his argu- 
ments, when he attempts to make the temporal indispensable 
to the spiritual power, and asserts the divine right to main- 
tain it when possessed, and the duty of acquiring it when 
not possessed, as equally indispensable parts of religious 
faith. The fact that the Italian people — otherwise devoted 
to the Church of Rome — repudiated this doctrine both po- 



THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 379 

litically and religiously, should have impressed his mind with 
its want of adaptability to the present condition of the 
world, distinguished as it is either by some form of progress 
or the popular desire for it among all the nations. Yet, in- 
stead of coming to some terms with this progressive spirit 
among the Italians — which needed only acquiescence in the 
loss of the temporal power — he was constrained by the united 
pledge of the College of Cardinals, at the time of his elec- 
tion, to persist in the protesting and aggressive policy of 
his immediate predecessor. And as he could not turn back 
without an entire abandonment of the temporal power, he 
has been likewise constrained to define the extent to which 
this power, if restored, must be recognized, as a matter of 
religious faith, beyond Rome and the States of the Church. 
Without this, the faithful would have been left to suppose 
that the restoration was designed only to force an absolute 
temporal monarch upon the people of Italy without their 
consent, and, therefore, that no religious motive for it ex- 
isted. Consequently he defined the universal faith to be 
that, by the restoration of the temporal power, the pope 
would become again so absolutely sovereign and independent 
of all Governments that he could not "be placed under the 
jurisdiction of the civil authority" anywhere in the world, 
so that whatsoever he shall command in his "mission of 
guiding humanity," he must be obeyed, no matter what any 
civil authority may provide to the contrary; that is, that the 
laws of every State, in conflict with such religious dogmas 
as he shall announce, must become void and inoperative in 
so far as they may impede the measures directed by him. 
Entering upon particulars, he does not shrink from the re- 
sponsibility of declaring, as we have seen, that the nope 
must have power to prevent schism and heresy, which in- 
cludes the means necessary to suppress them ; that is, to put 
an end to Protestantism and all that it has produced. He 
alone must decide "religious disputes," and every question 
involving dogmas and morality, and what he shall determine 
concerning all these must direct and guide the consciences of 



380 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

all "the faithful" throughout the world. And he shall have, 
the right "to enforce the execution" of whatsoever judg- 
ment he shall pronounce, no matter whether against Gov- 
ernments, communities, or individuals. The word "enforce" 
is his own, evidently employed with a full understanding of 
its import; for the completeness of his style shows that it is 
not his habit to waste words, or to use them without delib- 
eration. He could not have intended a resort to force as a 
primary remedy against heresy, but probably considers it 
justifiable when circumstances render it necessary, as in the 
cases of rebellious and obdurate heretics whose defiance of 
papal authority becomes flagrant. It is desirable, however, 
to follow him further, in order to become entirely familiar 
with the practical working of his doctrines, as he himself 
applied them to the state of affairs with which he was di- 
rectly concerned, in carrying on the battle with "irreligion" 
and the revolution. 

When the Archbishops and Bishops of Umbria deemed 
it proper to protest to the Piedmontese Government against 
its infringement of papal rights, Cardinal Pecci was chosen 
by them as specially fitted for that delicate and important 
work. As the population of Piedmont were Roman Cath- 
olic, and there had been no attempt on the part of the Gov- 
ernment to interfere with what they considered the estab- 
lished faith of the Church upon strictly religious points, this 
protest was mainly intended to express opposition to the laws 
which regulated the relations of the clergy to the State, by 
requiring them to obey the public statutes, as they are re- 
quired to do in the United States, and in such couutries as 
have disunited Church and State. Up till that time they 
had been an exclusive and independent class, with privileges 
and prerogatives not enjoyed by the mass of citizens — such 
as exemption from taxes and from the support of the Gov- 
ernment — and to the change in these relations this protest was 
intended to apply. The laws then existing were considered 
an irreligious invasion of the liberty of the clergy; that is, 



THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 381 

of their right of exemption from all governmental obliga- 
tions. Consequently the feeling upon the subject became 
very intense among the clergy, as was to be expected after so 
many years of license and indulgence; and it furnished Car- 
dinal Pecci with the opportunity of making an admirable 
display of his intellectual powers and eloquence. Without 
preface, he came to the question directly in these words: "It 
is a grievous error against Catholic doctrine to pretend that 
the Church is the subject of any earthly power, and bound 
by the same economy and relations which regulate civil so- 
ciety. The Church is not a human institution, nor is it a 
portion of the political edifice, although it is destined to pro- 
mote the welfare of the men among whom it lives. It af- 
firms that from God came directly its own being, its constitu- 
tion, and the necessary faculties for attaining its own sublime 
destiny, which is one different (from that of the State), and 
altogether of a supernatural order. Divinely ordered, with a 
hierarchy of its own, it is by its nature independent of the 
State." 

He makes the whole superstructure of his argument rest 
upon the foundation that as the constitution and all the fac- 
ulties of the Church came from God, therefore it must of 
necessity have a "hierarchy of its own," and entirely "inde- 
pendent of the State;" that is, the clergy must be bound to 
obey the pope, and released from all obligation to obey the 
laws of the State, unless they also shall be approved by the 
pope. To require from them this obedience to State laws, 
"invades," according to this protest, " the sacred province of 
the priesthood," as well, also, as "the rights and liberties of 
the Church," because it tempts them "away from the due 
subjection to their superiors," who are governed only by the 
pope and the Canon law. And, in order to show that the 
Church can not tolerate liberalism in the form of the free- 
dom of religious belief or of the press, this protest deplores 
the "licentiousness of the theater and the press, and the 
continual snares laid to surprise pious souls, to undermine 



382 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

faith by circulating infamous pamphlets and heteredox writ- 
ings, and by the declamations of fanatical preachers of im- 
piety;" 2 in other words, by Protestantism and Protestants. 

Cardinal Pecci dealt more directly with the "irreligion 
and libertinism " of the present age in a Lenten pastoral 
"on the current errors against religion and Christian life." 
He here expressed himself with severe intolerance against 
those who proclaim that "man is free in his own conscience; 
he can embrace any religion he likes ;" that is, he condemned 
the freedom of religious belief. He could not have done 
otherwise without causing his fidelity to the papacy to be 
suspected. Consequently, he made his meaning perfectly 
clear, so that none of the faithful could mistake it, and 
doubtless because the freedom of conscience is necessary to 
popular government, which, in serving the pope, he was 
obliged to condemn. Nevertheless, he was driven to the 
necessity of admitting that man is created "free and gifted 
with reason," but sought to break the force of the admission 
by insisting that this natural freedom must be subject to re- 
straint, because God has imposed obligations upon him and 
dictated laws fof him which he is bound to obey. He, how- 
ever, gives no latitude to the individual and makes no allow- 
ance for his private conscience, but considers him incompe- 
tent to decide for himself within the scope of religious laws, 
and as fit only for obedience to authority ; that is, the Church 
at Pome, and the pope who may, for the time being, preside 
over it. In setting forth the manner in which God has made 
known his laws for the direction and government of indi- 
vidual consciences, and how he requires them to be obeyed, he 
insists that they are only such as the Poman Church has 
announced, and that the natural right of the human reason 
to its freedom must be restrained into obedience to them, so 
that the only liberty of thought or conscience to be allowed 
must be that which centers in this obedience. To him any 
other freedom than this violates the divine law, and is heresy. 



> Life of Leo XIII. By O'Reilly. Pages 219 to 222. 



THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 383 

But he plainly involves himself in the absurdity of suppos- 
ing that to be freedom which is the very reverse of it ; for 
there can be no proposition more palpably true than that a 
man has no freedom of thought or conscience when con- 
strained, by a force he is powerless to resist, to exchange his 
own opinions for those of others. It may well be doubted 
whether opinions formed under the dictation of authority are 
in fact such. Fear of consequences may induce acquies- 
ence in them, or even their avowal ; but as the laws which 
govern the mind and conscience have no agency in their pro- 
duction, they are simple utterances of the lips which are not 
responded to by the heart. This must be the case with en- 
lightened minds, except where pre-existing opinions are 
changed by the force of argument and new enlightenment. 
The papacy understood this, and therefore kept in ignorance 
the populations within the circle of its influence and juris- 
diction ; and Cardinal Pecci, instructed as his mind was 
upon general topics, was unable to conceive any other meth- 
ods of human thought than those instilled into his mind by 
his Jesuit education, and which his official position made it 
necessary for him to maintain. 

Controlled entirely by the idea of unresisting and unin- 
quiring obedience to authority, without any regard for the dic- 
tates of individual conscience or the suggestions of reason, he 
announced the logical result of his own and the papal teach- 
ings in these words: "Nor is it left to the free will of man 
to refuse it, or to fashion for himself a form of worship and 
service such as he pleases to render." It does not require a 
man of learning to understand this ; it is plain and palpable 
to any ordinary, mind. He could have chosen no words 
more expressly condemnatory of the freedom of conscience; 
nor could he have more formally arraigned the people 
of the United States for having asserted the right of every 
man to worship God as his own conscience dictates, and 
having made that fundamental in their institutions and nec- 
essary to their existence. According to him this is heresy, 
because it draws the people away from obedience to the pope ; 



384 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

and no man has the right to refuse this obedience, or "to 
fashion for himself a form of worship or service" which the 
pope shall condemn ! He is immeasurably shocked at the 
idea that men should be permitted to entertain and express 
different religious opinions, and to reject the teachings of the 
pope, to whom alone implicit obedience is due ! He had 
too much character at stake to disguise anything upon this 
point — leaving that to others in free countries, where the 
pretense of toleration may be maintained with the hope that 
it may ultimately pave the way to papal intolerance. Con- 
tinuing, therefore, the same undisguised denunciation of the 
freedom of conscience, he says: "It would be npt only im- 
pious, but monstrous, to maintain every form of worship is 
acceptable and indifferent, that the human conscience is free 
to adopt whichever form it pleases, and to fashion out a re- 
ligion to suit itself." It is not necessary to comment here 
upon this bold and defiant assault upon our civil institu- 
tions. But it is well to remark that it ought to tinge the 
cheeks of those in this country who, in one breath, profess 
obedience to the pope who uttered the language here quoted, 
and in the next talk glibly about their advocacy of the free- 
dom of conscience, which he has condemned as "impious" 
and "monstrous" — as an unpardonable offense against God! 
He then proceeds to speak of the relation of the State to 
the education of the young, by saying that it is " not called 
upon to discharge this great parental duty, but to keep the 
natural educators in their work," by permitting it to "be 
carried on under the direction of the Church, the depository 
and teacher of religious doctrines." This is as if he had said 
that the State shall be forbidden to participate in the work of 
education even to the extent of teaching patriotism to its 
youth, for the reason that such State education has the ten- 
dency to substitute love of country for fidelity to the pope ; 
and for the further reason that all education that can be 
tolerated should "be carried on under the direction of the 
Church" and confined exclusively to "religious doctrines." 
He expresses the same idea more fully by insisting that all 



THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 385 

other kinds of education are "devoid of all the external 
practices and duties of the Christian faith, and calculated to 
familiarize young people with 'freedom of conscience' and 
indifferentism ;" that is, to encourage them in the belief that 
popular freedom is worth striving after, and that people are 
more prosperous and happy when governed by laws of their 
own making than by those dictated by the ambition of those 
who claim that they alone are divinely chosen to govern 
mankind. He sees nothing in such religious liberty as our 
institutions establish but " irreligion and libertinism," to which 
it has given rise, and against which he strives hard to enlist 
all the supporters of the papacy. 3 

From the papal standpoint his arguments are sound and 
logical, because the general enlightenment of the mind, which 
enables it to investigate and understand the causes of things, 
and makes it competent to form conclusions of its own, tends 
to create self-reliance and opposition to oppressive laws ; and 
has, on these accounts, been odious to the popes ever since 
they acquired temporal power and made the Church, by means 
of it, the most potent instrument in maintaining monarchism. 
Therefore the student of history finds that the papacy has 
grown weaker as the world has increased in enlightenment. 
But from the standpoint of our free institutions, both his 
positions and reasoning are radically wrong and indefensible, 
because they assail the freedom of conscience which our in- 
stitutions guarantee to every individual, and our common- 
school system, which is more responsive to the public senti- 
ment and will than any other measure of our public policy. 
The plain and manifest import of what he has said is this: 
That if he were allowed full liberty in this country to dictate 
what shall and what shall not be regarded as true religion, 
we would have neither freedom of conscience nor public 
schools. And this, by his subsequent elevation to the pon- 
tificate, constitutes to-day, the greatest if not the only danger 
which threatens our free, popular form of government. 



3 Life of Leo XIII, pp. 230 to 239. 

25 



386 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

By bis election as pope, Leo XIII occupies a different 
position from that filled by bim as Cardinal Pecci. In the 
latter be defended tbe papal doctrines and recommended 
them for strict observance by tbe faithful ; in the former he 
dictates and commands, allowing no discretion and submitting 
to no disobedience. Therefore it is manifestly proper, as well 
as necessary, that we in this country shall know to what ex- 
tent the religious doctrines of the cardinal are embodied in 
the authoritative teachings of the pope. In this latter capac- 
ity he has undoubtedly flattered himself, as Pius IX did, 
that he has at his back and subject to his command, Uvo 
hundred millions of obedient subjects throughout the world, 
and has, consequently, availed himself of his first consistorial 
allocution to prepare them for submission, by announcing that 
he has been chosen "to fill on earth the place of the Prince 
of pastors, Christ Jesus!" He must have known, when these 
words were traced by his pontifical pen, that Christ was never 
the pastor of an organized Church with a constitution of either 
spiritual or temporal government; that when the primitive 
Churches were established by the apostles, they were inde- 
pendent of each other ; that none of these ever had a bishop 
or a presbyter with temporal power in his hands; that this 
power was not acquired until after the fall of the Roman 
Empire, according to Pius IX, and not until several hundred 
years later, according to himself; and that even then it was 
wrenched from the people by the aid of ambitious monarchs 
and their armies, and maintained by the false and forged 
" douation of Constantine," the pseudo-decretals of Isidore, 
and other means long since repudiated in all parts of the 
world, and not now defended except by the most mendacious. 
Yet, with this knowledge in his possession, he strangely com- 
plains that the "Apostolic See" has been "violently stripped 
of its temporal sovereignty" in disobedience of the divine 
law — pretending thereby that Christ exercised and possessed 
such sovereignty when upon earth, and that he, as his only 
representative, is his legitimate successor! 

His mind must have been overflowing with exhilaration, 



THE CHURCH AND THE STATE. 387 

when, giving full play to his imagination, lie fancied himsell 
thus elevated above and superior to all other human beings. 
But, like many others who indulge in similar flights and 
" build castles in the air," the excesses of his fancy were 
checked by the conviction that the world was, at last, a prac- 
tical reality in what concerns its welfare, and that the Italian 
people, who had for many centuries submitted to papal do- 
minion, would not permit him to place the crown of tem- 
poral royalty upon his head. Seemingly saddened by this 
melancholy conviction, he fouud himself constrained to an- 
nounce to his " venerable brothers "of the episcopacy that 
the papacy had been "reduced to a condition in which it 
can in no wise enjoy the full, free, and unimpeded use of 
its powers," well knowing that it had not been deprived of 
any of its spiritual authority except that involved in his right 
to wear a temporal crown and govern the people arbitrarily 
as a temporal monarch. And then, under the stimulant of 
hope, he imposed upon them the religious obligation to labor 
for the restoration of this lost temporal power, by reminding 
them how gloriously Pius IX had served the papacy by his 
efforts " to re-establish the episcopal hierarchy " in Scotland, 
in the face of the Government of England and the religious 
sentiment of the Scotch people. Under the influence of 
these mingled emotions of despondency and hope, his pon- 
tificate commenced. What fruits it is destined to bear are 
hidden in the womb of time. What he intends to accom- 
plish, so far as he can, it is the duty of the civilized world to 
understand, not by what any cardinal, archbishop, bishop, or 
priest shall say, but as he himself has chosen officially to 
announce it. No other man upon earth besides him has the 
right, according to the papal theory, to prescribe a single 
tenet of religious faith, because he alone occupies the place 
of Christ upon earth ! 



CHAPTER XXI. 

THE CHURCH SUPREME. 

In all the encyclical letters issued by Leo XIII, he has 
exhibited the restlessness which may fairly be presumed to 
have been produced by discomfiture at finding the difficulties 
in the way of restoring the temporal power increasing rather 
than diminishing. This is in no way surprising, inasmuch 
as all the faculties of his mind are absorbed by contem- 
plation of the means of producing that result, his pontifical 
influence not being necessary to enforce the recognition of 
any other principle of faith. He is too intelligent not to 
realize that there is a strong tendency among the laity of the 
Church toward "liberal Catholicism" — especially among 
those who are sharing the advantages of free and popular 
government, like those in the United States — and that if this 
tendency is not checked by official rebuke in some way, the 
present age may destroy all hope of re-converting the pope 
into a crowned king and leave him forever hereafter in pos- 
session of spiritual power alone. Being unable to persuade 
himself that this ought to be acquiesced in, he steadily per- 
sists in trying to bring all peoples and nations within the 
circle of his pontifical jurisdiction, in so far as matters in- 
volving faith, morals, and discipline — as he shall define 
them — are concerned. Hence we find him often announcing 
the principles by which all the Roman Catholics throughout 
the world are to be governed in their relations with civil in- 
stitutions. And, in order to show that he is unwilling to 
abate any of his own claims to official royalty, he invariably 
assumes the attitude of a universal guardian, and, conse- 
quently, employs the language of authority. He, manifestly, 
continues now to speak in the same spirit which heretofore 
388 



THE CHURCH SUPREME. 389 

prompted him to affirm " that the false wisdom or philosophy 
which the last three centuries have followed must be set aside, 
and Christian wisdom and philosophy made the light of educa- 
tion. . . . Religion, Christianity, Catholicism, must now 
come with the steady, unfailing lamp of her divine phi- 
losophy, extricate social order from its mortal peril, and lead it 
back to the old paths." 1 The remedy is evidently plain and 
simple to his mind — merely this, and nothing more — that the 
modern world shall return " to obedience to the Church," by 
the " docile acceptance of the teachings of the one divinely-ap- 
pointed authority on earth " — who is now himself, and after 
him to be his successors. What strange infatuation it must 
be for one so enlightened as Leo XIII undoubtedly is, to 
suppose that he can so wield the scepter of his spiritual au- 
thority over the nations as to cause them to " set aside" their 
present progress and prosperity, and be led " back to the old 
paths !" 

He omits no opportunity to renew his claim of spiritual 
authority over "the life, the morals, and the institutions of 
nations " — that is, over their constitutions and laws — to the 
extent of requiring them to conform to " the precepts of 
Christian wisdom " as promulgated from the papal throne. 
Such nations as shall do this he recognizes as having claim 
to permanent existence ; such as do not, possess only illegiti- 
mate power obtained by usurpation. To " set aside" the 
latter — especially when they have so disregarded " Christian 
wisdom and philosophy " as to separate Church and State — 
he evidently regards as a duty, not only incumbent upon 
himself, but upon all who accept his teachings as infallibly 
true. To enforce this obligation, therefore, to make the 
pope, and not the people, the sovereign source of civil power 
in all that pertains to faith — as the restoration of the tem- 
poral power does — he maintains the proposition that Roman 
Catholics everywhere owe their first duty to the Church, and, 
after that, allegiance to the State ; that is, they are not 



i Life of Leo XIII. By O'Reilly. Pages 482-483. 



390 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

bound to obey any law of a State which requires them to do 
anything prejudicial to the Church. Consequently, his pon- 
tifical teachings concentrate in this : that when he shall offi- 
cially declare that any law of a State conflicts with the di- 
vine law, their primary duty is to obey him, although, by so 
doing, they shall violate the law of the State. And, in order 
to assure this, he requires them to obey their bishops, and 
the bishops to obey him. While he recognizes the right of 
States to regulate such merely secular affairs as concern the 
common and ordinary interests of society, the spiritual au- 
thority he claims over them is sufficient to enable him to in- 
terfere with and regulate at his own discretion such matters 
as are within his spiritual jurisdiction, as he shall define it, 
because " the Church is the mistress of all nations." From 
this sovereignty — which breaks over the geographical boun- 
daries of nations, as if none existed — he derives the right of 
the Church to " concern herself about the laws formulated 
in the State ;" that is, to interfere with political questions 
which involve the interests of the Church. And this inter- 
ference is justified upon the ground, not only that it is pro- 
motive of the welfare of the State, but because, in the ab- 
sence of it, the States sometimes transcend their just powers 
by encroaching upon the rights of the Church — as they do 
by separating Church and State, and prescribing an inde- 
pendent sphere for each. This last offense is, with him, un- 
pardonable, because they who commit it — as the people of 
the United States have done — " tear asunder civil and sacred 
polity, bound together as they are in their very essence." 

These religious doctrines are not alone the official utter- 
ances of Leo XIII. They are inherent in both the papal 
and Jesuit systems, neither of which can exist without them. 
The Jesuit theory is that no legitimate rights can be acquired 
under any constitution or law which violates the divine law 
as the pope shall interpret it ; and that the violation of such 
constitution or law is neither treason nor rebellion, because, 
being null and void, they can impose no just obligation of 
obedience. The authoritative utterance of these doctrines 



THE CHURCH SUPREME. 391 

now, and the requirement of obedience to them, constitute a 
grave and serious fact, which should arrest universal atten- 
tion. For obvious reasons they demand this attention from 
the people of the United States more than from any other 
peoples, because the freedom and tolerance of our Govern- 
ment allow their promulgation, notwithstanding their mani- 
fest and direct tendency to encourage traitorous plottings 
against our popular institutions. Looking only to our own 
time — the pontificates of Pius IX and Leo XIII, to say 
nothing of such popes as Gregory VII, Innocent III, and 
Boniface VIII — we find the well-defined papal policy to con- 
demn as violative of the divine law these fundamental prin- 
ciples of our institutions : The separation of Church and 
State; the freedom of conscience and religious belief; the 
liberty of speech and press ; the subjection of ecclesiastics to 
obedience to the laws like other citizens ; the people as the 
exclusive depositories of political power ; the refusal to con- 
cede to the pope the potential power of conferring upon 
bishops and clergy the prerogative right to manage church 
property in contravention of the laws ; and last, but far 
from being least, our common-school system as it prevails in 
every part of the country. A man, therefore, must be 
stupid if he can not, and willful if he will not, see that, ac- 
cording to the religious doctrines announced by Pius IX and 
Leo XIII — omitting other popes — all these great, fundamen- 
tal principles of our Government, and all the laws enacted 
to preserve them, are held to be impious, and so in violation 
of the divine law that they may be rightfully resisted when- 
soever the pope shall find it expedient so to command. 
What question of greater magnitude and importance could 
command the attention of both Protestant and Roman Cath- 
olic citizens of the United States ? It is a direct blow aimed 
by a foreign and alien power at the very foundation of our 
civil institutions. If it has been incited by the indifference 
of Protestants, they, being apprised of this, are bound by 
the obligation of patriotism to rebuke it. . If the pope has 
acted only upon the Jesuit theory that the laity of the Church 



392 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

are only animals, and fit only for passive obedience to their 
superiors, who assume to be their masters, they will prove 
themselves unworthy of American citizenship if they do not 
assert their manhood sufficiently to teach the pope that it 
would be a higher offense against divine justice to plot 
treason against a Government they have sworn to support 
and defend, than to disobey one from whose head their own 
religious brethren plucked a temporal crown, and who is now 
endeavoring to stir them up to a war against those same 
brethren in order that his lost crown may be restored. They 
who ask this, and all their aiders and abettors, have doubt- 
less been encouraged by a knowledge of American and Prot- 
estant tolerance, as well as by the desire to reduce our Roman 
Catholic population to the humiliating condition of profess- 
ing allegiance to the Government, while, at the same time, 
they cherish the hope of its ultimate overthrow by some mys- 
terious providences not yet revealed. To indicate the ground 
upon which this hope may rest, the country is every now 
and then reminded of the estimated number of Roman Cath- 
olics it contains— varying from 8,000,000 to 12,000,000— as 
if all these could be rightfully counted upon the papal side 
in a war upon the most cherished principles of the Govern- 
ment, just as plantation-slaves were formerly counted before 
being put to work in the fields. How far they, are destined 
to disappointment in this remains to be seen. But it is con- 
fidently believed — with assurance, indeed, somewhat exceed- 
ing belief — that they have been misled by the false and de- 
lusive hope of converting the multitude of Roman Catholics 
in this country into mere unthinking machines, subject, as if 
they were all Jesuits, to passive and uninquiring obedience to 
an alien authority which assumes the spiritual and preroga- 
tive right to turn " back to the old paths" all the modern 
progressive nations, as if God had deputed to him alone this 
extraordinary and plenary power over the interests and hap- 
piness of the whole human family. While we are waiting 
patiently to see what the future shall reveal with reference 
to these matters, the Protestants of the United States can 



THE CHURCH SUPREME. 393 

not be released from the obligation of preparing for whatso- 
ever exigency the future shall present. Every avenue of ap- 
proach to the citadel which has thus far guarded their con- 
stitutional and popular rights, must be carefully guarded. 
They should not be indifferent to the slow and insidious 
methods of approaching that citadel which Jesuit ingenuity 
has contrived and is still contriving. Nor should the popu- 
lar eye be turned too far away from Leo XIII ; for if he, too, 
has no sinister object in view with regard to our cherished 
national principles, why, " in the name of all the gods at 
once," does he not leave the United States and the other mod- 
ern nations to conduct their own affairs without his perpetual 
interference? Why do he and his ecclesiastical representatives 
so unceasingly thunder in our ears the awful penalties that 
await us for the infidelity of Protestantism, for the separa- 
tion of Church and State, for the toleration of diversities of 
religious belief, and for our "godless" common schools? 

It requires but limited intelligence to see that the Jesuits 
alone — and not the Church — would gain if the principles and 
policy of Leo XIII should become established. They would 
see in such a result cause for rejoicing that the work of their 
society had been so well done when the youthful and plastic 
mind of Joachim Pecci had their doctrines so indelibly 
stamped upon it that now, when he has become pope in his old 
age, he seems to keep himself alive by the stimulating hope 
of successfully employing them to arrest modern progress and 
civilization, and turn the nations back " to the old paths." 
The Jesuits already exhibit signs of exultation, arising, 
manifestly, out of the belief that the pontifical favor and 
patronage bestowed upon them has caused the world to for- 
get their history ; how they endeavored to fix disrepute upon 
the Church by their conduct in India, China, Paraguay, and 
elsewhere ; how they disobeyed the peremptory commands of 
some popes, and endeavored to degrade and humiliate others; 
how they were compelled to obedience only by the severest 
methods of reproof; how they were expelled from every 
Eoman Catholic country in Europe, and from Rome by Pius 



394 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

IX, during the last years of his pontificate ; how they were 
suppressed and abolished by one of the best of the popes for 
crimes that could not be condoned ; how they abused and 
vilified his name and memory in order to justify their re- 
fusal to obey the authoritative commands of the Church ; 
and how their revival was excused alone upon the ground 
that they were better fitted than any other body of men in 
the world, by habit, education, and training, to become war- 
riors in the cause of political absolutism. 

But a still more flattering cause of Jesuit satisfaction is 
doubtless found in the fact that Leo XIII — faithful to his 
early impressions — has assigned to the members of that so- 
ciety the special duty of becoming the educators of the 
young, and is sending them into all the countries of the 
world, and especially those where Protestantism prevails, for 
that particular purpose, well instructed, beforehand, in the 
obligation to maintain such a system of education as he es- 
tablished in Perugia, so that every mind seduced by its in- 
fluence may be brought to the religious belief that Church 
and State must be so united that the State shall be subordi- 
nate to the Church ; that there is but one form of true re- 
ligion in the world, and all else is heresy ; and that no Gov- 
ernment can have the divine approval which does not 
recognize the pope as possessing the sovereign- power to dic- 
tate its policy in so far as all matters touching faith, morals, 
and discipline are involved. Evidences of this settled pur- 
pose are constantly crowding upon us. Scarcely a day passes 
without some fresh attack upon our system of common 
schools — a method of education which has the popular ap- 
proval in a far greater degree than any other part of our 
public polity. These are called " godless" schools because 
they are not permitted by law to teach that the Roman 
Catholic religion is absolutely true, and all other forms of 
religious belief false and heretical. It is alleged that they 
are the nurseries of vice and immorality, and that they send 
out young men and women into the world to propagate error 
and libertinism, and sow the seed of moral and social de- 



THE CHURCH SUPREME. 395 

cay. Every now and then some fanatical priest — unable to 
keep his passions within reasonable bounds — threatens the 
members of his congregation with excommunication for send-, 
ing their children to the public schools, and allowing them 
to become contaminated by false teaching and association 
with Protestant children. The American people, consequently, 
are required to decide whether their system of common 
schools shall live or die, whether the, competent and distin- 
guished corps of American teachers shall be expelled, and 
the doors of our school-houses be thrown wide open to the 
Jesuits. Why should the Protestant part of our population 
remain indifferent when these insults are so impudently 
flung in their faces ? They have deemed it wise and better 
for themselves, and out of kindly deference to their assail- 
ants, to prohibit the teaching of any system of religious be- 
lief in their public schools, or the levy of any tax for that 
object ; and, in order that Church and State shall remain 
perpetually separated, they have provided for this inhibition 
by constitutional provisions — both National and State. To 
the Jesuit, therefore, all this is " godless," and the Govern- 
ment is " godless" for separating Church and State, and the 
Protestant people are " godless," rapidly hastening to in- 
evitable ruin in this life and to fearful punishment hereafter! 
There ought to come a time when this controversy, forced 
upon the people against their will, shall cease. Our public 
schools are designed for training and educating American 
citizens — those who are to perpetuate our institutions when 
existing generations have passed away — and it is no special 
wonder that those who do not come up to the full measure 
of American citizenship themselves, and desire that others 
shall not do so, are seeking to destroy them. Notwithstand- 
ing they are fully protected in the right of maintaining and 
conducting their own private schools in their own way, with- 
out the least interference from any quarter, they have pre- 
sumptuously, if not insolently, inaugurated a relentless war- 
fare upon our whole system of public education, because our 
common schools are nurseries of patriotism, and keep alive 



396 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

in the minds of our children the obligation of obedience to 
the Constitution and Government as they are. If the system 
we have so long cherished were weakened materially by this 
malignant warfare, it would be the just cause of serious 
alarm. But everything occurring creates a contrary belief, 
by giving assurauce that it continues to disseminate influ- 
ences fast reachiug the most remote and obscure places in 
the country, causing the popular heart to rejoice at the vic- 
tories it has already won over ignorance and vice, and mani- 
festing that it possesses established power sufficient to assure 
continued growth and complete triumph. Nevertheless, it 
is well and important for us all to know what attitude Leo 
XIII occupies toward our common schools, and what kind 
of education he proposes to establish here in preference to 
that we have cherished so highly. In this way it will be 
plainly seen that his first and highest object is the extermi- 
nation of Protestantism, by putting out of the power of those 
who obey him implicitly to become American citizens in the 
sense and meaning of the Constitution of the United States. 
He knows nothing of the nature of this citizenship or of 
the obligations it imposes. As a foreigner and alien, ig- 
norant of our language, Constitution, and wants, his chief 
object is to create here a politico-religious party, held in unity 
by the desire to restore to him his lost crown as a religious 
duty, so that when he shall have succeeded in that he may 
bring us all within his spiritual jurisdiction, and deal with 
us accordingly. This accomplished, the history of the papacy 
for more than a thousand years proves that the next step 
would be to treat our nationality as a fiction and our boun- 
dary-lines as merely imaginary, so that instead of our present 
independence we should be reduced to an inferior and sub- 
missive department in a vast and universal " Holy Empire," 
with its crown resting upon his own head, and, after him, 
upon the heads of his successors. 

Not very long ago Leo XIII sent to the United States 
an official representative in the person of Mgr. Satolli, 
nominally Archbishop of Lepanto, in Greece. He is called 



The church supreme. 397 

a " delegate," but in view of the fact that he fully repre- 
sents the pope, as his other self, and that his powers are so 
complete and plenary that no appeal can be taken from his 
decisions, it is more appropriate to call him a vice-pope. He 
is said to be a learned and discreet man, and it is doubtless 
true that he deserves all the compliments otherwise bestowed 
upon him. He had not, however, been long in this country 
before he found that there were divisions of sentiment 
among the Roman Catholics with reference to our common 
schools, some sending their children to them, notwithstanding 
the instructions of their priests not to do so, and others re- 
fusing because they considered them " godless ;" that is, in- 
fidel. This . devolved upon him the duty and necessity of 
deciding a question which had hitherto baffled the most in- 
genious minds — a question made more difficult by the fact 
that it involved either the approval or disapproval of well- 
established and popular measures of public polity. His de- 
cision is entitled to consideration, and should be closely 
scrutinized, inasmuch as it is claimed for it that it is the 
final solution of a great and puzzling problem. The state- 
ment of it which follows, is taken substantially from that 
made by himself to the archbishops at a meeting held by 
them in New York. 

He claims for " the Catholic Church" both " the duty 
and divine right" of teaching religion to " all nations," and 
of "instructing the young;" that is, "she holds for herself 
the right of teaching the truths of faith and law of morals 
in order to bring up youth in the habits of Christian life." 
Nevertheless, " there is no repugnance in their learning the 
first elements and the higher branches of the arts and natural 
sciences in public schools controlled by the State," which 
protects them in their persons and property. "But," he 
continues, " the Catholic Church shrinks from those features 
of public schools which are opposed to the truth of Chris- 
tianity and to morality ;" wherefore he insists that every effort 
shall be made, both by the bishops and others, to remove 
these "objectionable features." And he recommends that the 



398 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

bishops and the civil authorities shall agree " to conduct the 
schools with mutual atteution and due consideration for their 
respective rights;" that is, that the schools shall be under 
their joint control, so that teachers " for the secular branches" 
shall be " inhibited from offendiug Catholic religion and mo- 
rality," and the Church be permitted to shed her " light" by 
" teaching the children catechism, in order to remove danger 
to their faith and morals from any quarter whatsoever." 

This was adroit, but not satisfactory. Although it was 
understood that Mgr. Satolli's decisions were to be final, this 
created such dissaffection that it was found necessary to sub- 
mit the matter to the pope, against whose opinion, when 
officially promulgated, there could be no protest. Leo XIII 
deliberated upon the matter for some time, and received from 
the American prelates arguments upon both sides. He, 
however, reached a conclusion which he communicated to 
Cardinal Gibbons in an encyclical dated May 31, 1893, 
which constitutes one of the latest papal utterances. Besides 
its numerous recitals, some of which do not bear directly 
upon the subject, he distinctly approves the decision of Mgr. 
Satolli, because it had been approved and recommended to 
him by the archbishops at their meeting in New York. He 
expresses great admiration for the people of the United 
States — especially the Roman Catholic portion of them — and 
says that he had sent Mgr. Satolli here in order that his 
" presence might be made, as it were, perpetual among the 
faithful by the permanent establishment of an apostolic dele- 
gation at Washington." This he probably considers a precau- 
tionary step; for, as Mgr. Satolli can not have any official re- 
lations with our Government — Italy being represented by a 
minister appointed by the king — he can remain as a "per- 
manent establishment" at the Capital of the nation, so that 
he may not only watch the course of events, but be in 
readiness to become an apostolic minister plenipotentiary 
whensoever, by the aid of the faithful outside of Italy, he 
shall be able to snatch the crown from the head upon which 
the Italian people have placed it, and put it upon his own ! 



THE CHURCH SUPREME. 399 

The approval of Mgr. Satolli's decision, however, has this 
important condition attached to it by Leo XIII : "That Cath- 
olic schools are to be most sedulously 'promoted, and that it is to 
be left to the judgment and conscience of the ordinary to 
decide, according to the circumstances, when it is lawful and 
when unlawful to attend public schools." This is a most 
significant condition. In the first place, it takes away from 
the parents the right to direct the education of their children, 
and places it in the hands of the ordinary, who officially 
represents the papal power. In the second place, it leaves 
the papal condemnation and censure still resting upon our 
system of common schools, and only removes it, here and there, 
from such local and particular schools as the ordinaries of the 
Church may find acceptable to them. And in the third 
place, it is a positive and unqualified affirmance of what 
multitudes of priests have said, that our schools are "god- 
less," and that, in order to counteract their irreligious in- 
fluences, "Catholic schools are to be most sedulously pro- 
moted." 

But there is another condition attached by Leo XIII 
which is equally significant as that just named. It is due to 
him that this should be stated in his own words. He says : 
"As we have already declared in our letter of the 23d of 
May of last year, to our venerable brethren, the archbishop 
and bishop of the province of New York, so we again, as far 
as need be, declare that the decrees which the Baltimore Councils, 
agreeably to the directions of the Holy See, have enacted 
concerning parochial schools, and whatsoever else has been pre- 
scribed by the Roman pontiffs, whether directly or through the 
sacred congregations, concerning the same matter, are to be 
steadfastly observed." 

Whatsoever powers the pope may have intended to confer 
upon Mgr. Satolli — whether those of a vice-pope or of a mere 
legate — it is certain that he did not intend to lessen his own. 
These are plenary, and therefore his pontifical decisions are 
absolutely binding, because he is infallible ! In order, there- 
fore, to ascertain the relation to be hereafter borne to our 



400 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

common-school system by the Roman Catholics of the United 
States, we are required to look to the decision of Mgr. Satolli 
as qualified by the conditions attached to it by Leo XIII. 
Taking the whole together, it amounts to this : That God has 
specially appointed the Roman Catholic Church the educator 
of the young; that where another system of education is set 
up against that prescribed by the Church, it is necessarily 
sinful and heretical, and may be rightfully overthrown and 
destroyed; that the Church system of education requires that 
the pupils shall be taught religion, and, first and always, that 
there is no other true religion besides that which the Roman 
Catholic Church teaches ; that notwithstanding this, a Roman 
Catholic child may, as a matter of either necessity or ex- 
pediency, be sent to the public schools of the States, merely 
to learn "the first elements," reading, writing, and cipher- 
ing, and "the higher branches of the arts and natural sci- 
ences," mathematics, chemistry, engineering, etc.; that the 
Roman Catholic Church shrinks from the idea that the inter- 
mediate branches should be taught the children, for fear they 
should discover that the Protestant nations are more prosper- 
ous and happy than the Roman Catholic ; that when Roman 
Catholic children are sent to the public schools, efforts shall 
be made to procure the appointment of Roman Catholic 
teachers to instruct them in their religious obligations and 
duties, and specially to the effect that Protestantism is heresy 
and diversities of religious belief offensive to God, and con- 
sequently has his curse resting upon it; that the "objection- 
able features" of our school system must be removed by plot- 
tings within the schools necessary to that end, so that instead 
of being free they shall be made Church schools; that so long 
as the children are not taught the "catechism" they will re- 
main "godless" and heretical; and that if in any of the 
schools the children shall be taught that the State ought to 
continue separated from the Church, or that differences of 
religious belief should be tolerated, or that our Protestant 
institutions must be preserved as they are — all or either of 
these things must be considered as "offending Catholic re- 



THE CHURCH SUPREME. 401 

ligion and morality." Thus far Mgr. Satolli; but the pope 
adds the peremptory injunction that Roman Catholic schools 
must be "most sedulously promoted;" that is, they must be 
set up in rivalry to our common-school system, so that the 
antidote may root out the bane ; that the ordinary, and not 
the parents, shall decide what children shall be permitted to 
enter the schools; and that, in interpreting the decision of 
Mgr. Satolli, it must be done in accordance with the decrees 
of the Baltimore Councils and the rules "prescribed by the 
Roman pontiffs." 

This settles nothing, and leaves the whole question am- 
biguous. It is Jesuitical, because it " palters with us in a 
double sense," by keeping "the word of promise to our 
ear," while breaking "it to our hope." In referring to the 
Baltimore Councils as their guide, the faithful find them- 
selves instructed to omit nothing within their power to pull 
down the common schools, and build up Church schools in 
their places, for the reason that the former are irreligious, 
and the latter alone have the divine approval. And they 
find also that they are instructed by the second Council of 
Baltimore that their children are to be taught, as an essen- 
tial part of their religion, that the State is not independent of 
the Church, and that " all power is of God," so that what- 
soever the State prescribes not obedient to the law of God is 
not binding upon the citizen, and that the Roman Catholic 
has such "a guide in the Church ;" that if the State shall re- 
quire of him anything inhibited by the Church, he must 
obey the latter, and not the former. 2 But independently of 
this, the pope commands that these same faithful shall inter- 
pret the decision of Mgr. Satolli in the light of "whatsoever 
else has been prescribed by the Roman pontiffs." 

This is indefinite. There have been over two hundred 
and fifty popes. Many of these have been good, some bad, 

2 The pastoral letter of this Council can be found in Appleton's 
Annual Cyclopedia for 1866, p. 677. Its meaning is plain — that the 
Church is superior to the State, and must he obeyed by the State, in 
all such matters as the Church considers within its jurisdiction. 

2§ 



402 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

but these latter forfeit Done of their infallible ecclesiastical 
authority by being bad. To whom, among all these, shall 
the inquirer defer, when he investigates what they have 
commanded with reference to education? Many of them 
have asserted, ex cathedra, that the exclusive right to educate 
the young has been divinely conferred upon the Roman 
Catholic Church, and Leo XIII, in his recent letter to the 
American Cardinal, makes that assertion unequivocally. It 
is not believed that any pope ever asserted the contrary. 
Therefore, this general and sweepting qualification of Mgr. 
Satolli's decision either destroys its effect absolutely, or leaves 
it to uncertain rules of interpretation. Thus viewed it leaves 
the school question just as it stood before Mgr. Satolli came 
to this country. 

But Mgr. Satolli himself provides for two school sys- 
tems, which, as he regards them, are the rivals of each 
other, because he, like Leo XIII, considers the Roman Cath- 
olic Church as having had divinely conferred upon it the 
right of educating and training the young. But Leo XIII 
makes this idea of more prominence when he commands 
" that Catholic schools are to be most sedulously promoted." 
It all, therefore, amounts to this : that wheresoever there is a 
Roman Catholic who can not avoid it, he may send his 
children to the common schools for the sole purpose of hav- 
ing them taught " the first elements, and the higher branches 
of the arts and natural sciences;" but in all the intermediate 
departments of education, they must be under the exclusive 
charge of those appointed by the Church to be their instruct- 
ors in religion. Hence, not only is there to be a continued 
rivalry between the schools, but between the systems as 
well. In the common schools the pupils are taught that our 
popular form of government is calculated to promote and 
preserve the general welfare ; that our fathers acted wisely 
and well when they separated the State from the Church ; 
that laws w T hich require universal conformity to any particu- 
lar form of religious faith, are not only unwise but violative 
of natural right; that those people who govern themselves 



THE CHURCH SUPREME. 403 

by laws of their own making are happier and more prosper- 
ous than those who suffer themselves to be governed by 
monarchs and princes; and that the regulation of public 
affairs by constitutional governments is better for society than 
where they are regulated at the will of any one man. In 
the papal schools — perhaps within a stone's-throw of the com- 
mon schools — the pupils are taught that each one of these 
propositions is heresy, and that both those who teach and 
those who accept them as true are under Divine condemna- 
tion. In the common schools the teacher enforces what he 
says by the example of the United States, gives instruction 
in our Revolutionary history, explains the provisions of our 
National and State constitutions which make the people the 
only source of public law, and stimulates the patriotism of 
his pupils by urging upon them the necessity of perpetuating 
our institutions in their present form for the benefit of their 
posterity. In the papal schools the teacher is required, when 
he denounces all these provisions of our institutions as heresy, 
to enforce what he says by instructing his pupils that innu- 
merable infallible popes have so declared, and that they will 
offend God if they do not accept what they have announced 
as absolutely true , and in order that they may not be sus- 
pected of error by their youthful pupils, they need go no 
further back among the popes than to Pius IX and his 
"Syllabus" of 1864, wherein, after pointing out seventy-nine 
modern errors which he condemned — including "public 
schools" where teaching is "freed from all ecclesiastical 
authority" — he adds still another by declaring that it is im- 
possible that " the Roman pontiff can and ought to reconcile 
himself to, and agree with progress, liberalism, and civilization 
as lately introduced." Or, if it shall be found necessary to go 
further back than Pius IX, he need but refer to the cele- 
brated encyclical of his immediate predecessor, Gregory XVI, 
issued July 15, 1832, wherein he declared that those who 
maintained that God could be rightly served by men of differ- 
ent religious faiths, "will perish eternally without any doubt," 
if they do not repent and " hold to the Catholic faith ;" that 



404 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

it is "false and absurd" to pretend ''that liberty of con- 
science should be established and guaranteed to each man ;" 
that " the liberty of the press " is " the most fatal liberty, an 
execrable liberty, for which there never can be sufficient 
horror;" that writings which are "destructive of the fidelity 
and submission due to princes" are to be condemned, be- 
cause they enkindle "the firebrands of sedition ;" that "divine 
and human rights then rise in condemnation against those 
who, by the blackest machinations of revolt and sedition, en- 
deavor to destroy the fidelity due to princes, and to hurl 
them from their thrones;" that "constant submission to 
princes" necessarily has its source "in the holiest principles 
of the Christian religion ;" that they are criminal in the sight 
of God who "demand the separation of Church and State 
and the rupture of concord between the priesthood and the 
empire," that is, the State ; and that the union of Church 
and State is feared and opposed by the advocates of liberty, 
because it "has always been so salutary and so happy for 
Church and State." 3 

If, however, the pupils in these papal schools should in- 
dicate the suspicion that these official proclamations of doc- 
trine by Pius IX and Leo XIII had not the sanction of 
earlier popes, their teachers, especially if Jesuits, will take 
delight in instructing them that these two last popes, at the 
foot of the list, are following strictly in the footsteps of some 
of the most conspicuous of their predecessors. And then 
they will dwell eloquently upon the magnificent pontificates 
of Gregory VII, Alexander III, Innocent III, Boniface VIII, 
and others equally ambitious, but of less strength of will. 
The task will be an easy one to explain the history of these 
great popes and the politico-religious principles they suc- 
ceeded in grafting upon the dogmas of the Church. They 
will instruct them how Gregory VII plucked crowns from 
the heads of disobedient kings, released their subjects from 

3 The Lives and Times of the Roman Pontiffs. By De Montor. 
Vol. II, pp. 783-793, where this encyclical is given at length. This 
work has the special approval of the Archbishop of New York. 



THE CHURCH SUPREME. 405 

their allegiance, and placed other and obedient kings in 
their places ; how he claimed the right as pope to dispose of 
kingdoms, because ''the spiritual is above the temporal 
power" to so great an extent that all people "should mur- 
der their princes, fathers, and children if he commands it;" 
and how he made monarchs, princes, and peoples tremble 
before him, as if he, by virtue alone of his pontifical power, 
were master of the world. And they will show them how 
Alexander III released the German people from their alle- 
giance to Frederick Barbarossa, and compelled that proud 
emperor to kiss his foot, lead his horse by the bridle, and 
submit to having the papal heel planted upon his neck; and 
how Innocent III declared, by solemn pontifical decree, that 
the English Magna Charta was null and void, because it laid 
the foundation of popular liberty, and excommunicated all who 
were concerned in the patriotic work of obtaining it ; and how 
Boniface VIII decreed, in his bull " Glericis laicos" that lay 
governments " have no power over the persons or the property 
of ecclesiastics," and that those who shall impose tithes, taxes, 
and burdens upon them, without the authority of the pope, 
" shall incur excommunication ;" and how he also decreed, by 
his bull " Unam Sandam" that the Church — that is, the 
pope — holds in her hands both the spiritual and the temporal 
swords, with the power to compel the latter to be used for 
and in the interest of the former; that the temporal sword 
is, therefore, "subject to the spiritual power," and that it is 
"an article of necessary faith" that "every human being 
should be subject to the Roman pontiff." 

It requires but little intelligence to see wherein the differ- 
ence consists between these two systems of education — the 
one expanding, the other dwarfing the intellect. If, how- 
ever, each improved the intellect alike, the public schools 
are entitled to the preference for the reason that they instill 
into the minds of the pupils the great fundamental principles 
upon which our Government is founded ; whereas those who 
attend the papal schools are instructed that the most essen- 
tial of these principles are the fruitful source of heresies, 



406 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

and, consequently, of ills to the human family. The two 
systems, therefore, remain in conflict — just as they have 
hitherto been — and the greatest question the present genera- 
tion is called upon to decide is, Which shall triumph ? With 
those of us who desire to maintain our popular form of 
government, this question does not involve religious faith. 
But with the defenders of the papacy and followers of the 
pope it does. And, consequently, those who are willing to 
form a politico-religious party, pledged to restore temporal 
power to the pope, even at the possible hazard of a war with 
Italy, aud entangling alliances with other European powers, 
are promised a crown of eternal glory ; while those who are 
seeking to maintain our institutions as our fathers framed 
them are anathematized for the sin of rebellion against papal 
authority. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

JESUITICAL TEACHINGS. 

Inasmuch as Leo XIII has considered himself entitled, 
by virtue of his spiritual power, to prescribe authoritatively 
the relations which his followers in this country are hereafter 
to sustain to our system of public-school education, it is 
proper for us to inquire wherein the system he proposes to 
have introduced differs from our own. In this way we shall 
not only be able to understand the contrast between them, 
but discover why he gives the preference to the papal or 
Jesuit system. At the beginning of this inquiry, we are re- 
lieved from any trouble by his biographer, who tells us that 
while Cardinal Pecci, "he drew up, in 1858, a constitution 
and rules for an academy of St. Thomas Aquinas, which 
was to extend its benefits to the whole of Umbria," and that 
since he became pope he has " made the philosophical method 
of St. Thomas the guide of all Catholic teachers." 1 

Thomas Aquinas lived in the thirteenth century, long be- 
fore the Reformation, when the world was shrouded in the 
almost total darkness of the Middle Ages, and when obedi- 
ence to despotic rulers, both spiritual and temporal, was con- 
sidered the highest duty of life. Church and State were 
united, and the former governed the latter with "a rod of 
iron." Liberty of thought was suppressed by the fagot and 
the flame. He was a voluminous writer, mostly on theolog- 
ical subjects, and as he treated these in accordance with the 
system maintained by the popes — from whom all authority 
emanated — he was called the "Angel of the Schools," "An- 
gelic Doctor," " Eagle of the Theologians," and " Holy Doc- 



i Life of Leo XIII. By O'KeiUy. Page 151. 

407 



408 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

tor." He was canonized in 1323, about fifty years after 
his death, by John XXII, the second of the popes who reigned 
at Avignon in France, at a time when, according to De Mon- 
tor, "the Church languished in fearful anarchy." 2 These 
circumstances do not conspire to show his fitness as a guide 
for any system of modern education, especially that existing 
in the United States. The theology of the Middle Ages, 
which he vindicated, filled the world with superstition; and 
now, after the ignorance of that period has been dispelled by 
the light of the Reformation, there are none who desire to see 
this superstition and ignorance revived, except those who, 
like Leo XIII, consider the times before this light began to 
shine as the " blessed ages." 

This reverend biographer of Leo XIII says that the 
"false education" and " antichristian training" of the young, 
which prevails in the United States and among the liberal 
and progressive peoples of the world, must be done away 
with, abandoned, and "Thomas Aquinas must once more be 
enthroned as 'the Angel of the Schools;' his method and doc- 
trine must be the light of all higher teaching, for his works 
are only revealed truth set before the human mind in its most 
scientific form." 3 This prominence was not given to the 
doctrines of Aquinas as "revealed truth" without due con- 
sideration of their importance to the papacy. They- were 
specially taught in the schools of Umbria, under the auspices 
of Leo XIII. When he was archbishop, and since he became 
pope, he has made them the universal guide of "Catholic 
teachers" throughout the world. In obedience to the com- 
mand of Loyola himself, in his lifetime, they were also made 
"the basis of the entire curriculum of philosophy and di- 
vinity" in all Jesuit colleges and schools, and have thereby 
become an absolutely necessary and indispensable part of 
Jesuit education. It is thus made entirely clear that, what- 
soever else Leo XIII may or may not have accomplished 
during his pontificate, he has authoritatively commanded that 



2 De Montor, Vol. I, p. 493. s O'Reilly, pp. 482-483. 



JESUITICAL TEACHINGS. 409 

the doctrines of Thomas Aquinas shall be instilled into the 
minds*of all, both young and old, who may be brought under 
the influence of the papal system of education, in the United 
States as well as elsewhere. It is by this system, therefore, 
that he proposes to supplant our common schools, so that the 
end sought after by Loyola may be accomplished ; that is, the 
destruction of all popular governments. It will require only 
a brief examination of these doctrines to explain fully the 
purpose of Leo XIII in making them an indispensable part 
of Roman Catholic education in the United States, as well as 
to show that the papal theory of civil government is founded 
upon them as "revealed truth." 

In the first chapter of this volume reference was made to 
Balmes, a Spanish priest, who achieved the reputation of 
being "the boast of the Spanish clergy" and the ablest de- 
fender of the Jesuit doctrines. His mind was well stored 
with the philosophical teachings of Thomas Aquinas, to the 
study of which he devoted a number of years, adopting the 
interpretation put upon them in the commentaries of Bell- 
armine and Saurez, both of whom were Jesuits. He died in . 
1848, about the breaking out of the great revolutions among 
the Roman Catholic populations of Europe; but before that 
time had occupied himself in earnest efforts to turn back the 
tide which then threatened to overwhelm the papacy. His 
principal work designed for this purpose was intended, as 
stated in the first chapter, to counteract the influence of 
Guizot's treatise on civilization, which had produced very 
perceptible impressions upon the most enlightened minds of 
Europe in favor of Protestantism over Roman Catholicism. 
His special object, therefore, was to demonstrate that the 
reverse of what Guizot insisted upon was true, and that 
Roman Catholicism was the real source of all existing en- 
lightenment and civilization. Having written entirely from 
the Jesuit standpoint, his arguments with regard to the obli- 
gation of obedience to the laws of civil governments were 
based entirely upon the doctrines of the "Holy Doctor," as he 
called Thomas Aquinas. This may be justifiably inferred 



410 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

from what he says in highly eulogistic praise of him near 
the close of his work. 4 The doctriues he sets forth are com- 
mended to the people of the United States in the preface to 
the American edition of his work, where it is said that he 
has exposed "the shortcomings, or rather evils, of Protestant- 
ism, in a social and political point of view," and that " the 
Protestant, if sincere, will open his eyes to the incompati- 
bility of his principles with the happiness of mankind." 5 As 
this learned work has been extensively circulated in this 
country for the purpose here expressed, we are justified in 
accepting its doctrines and teachings, in both "a social and 
political point of view," as accurately expressing the opinions 
of Aquinas with regard to the right of civil governments to 
require obedience to their laws from all who live under them. 
And it is necessary for us to know and fully understand what 
these doctrines of Thomas Aquinas are, in order to become 
familiar with the "curriculum of philosophy and divinity" 
in Jesuit colleges and schools, and with the principles au- 
thoritatively prescribed by Leo XIII as "the guide of all 
Catholic teachers." When we shall have accomplished this, 
we shall be better able to decide whether or no it would be 
prodent and wise to exchange the course of studies now prose- 
cuted in our public schools for this papal and Jesuit curric- 
ulum ; whether our American schools shall be presided over 
by the spirit of the sainted and " Holy Doctor" or remain as 
they are, under the care, protection, and patronage of the 
American people. 

Balmes quotes Thomas Aquinas to prove that "human 
laws, if they are just, are binding in conscience, and derive 
their power from the eternal law, from which they are 
formed." 6 But he makes their justice to depend entirely upon 
their conformity to the divine law; in other words, applying 
his doctrine practically, as the pope possesses the only legiti- 
mate power upon earth to decide w 7 hat the divine law allows 
and what it condemns, therefore to him alone must the justice 



* Balmes, pp. 411-412. 5 Ibid., p. v. « Ibid., p. 320. 



JESUITICAL TEACHINGS. 411 

or injustice of all human laws be submitted ; and his decision, 
when made, is final and must be universally obeyed. Hence 
the obligation of obedience relates only to those laws which 
the pope shall decide to be just, while those he shall decide to 
be unjust shall be disregarded or resisted, or where open resist- 
ance is impracticable, may be plotted against and overthrown 
in whatsoever mode is most expedient. In order to illustrate 
and give emphasis to h4s meaning he asks: "Are we to obey 
the civil poiver ivhen it commands something that is evil in itself t" 
Answering he says: "No, we are not, for the simple reason 
that what is evil is forbidden by God ; now, we must obey 
God rather than man." He then supplements this with 
another question: "Are we to obey the civil power when it inter- 
feres with matters not included in ilie circle of its faculties t" He 
answers again : "No, for with regard to these matters it is 
not a power" And this limitation upon the civil power he 
explains further by affirming that the spiritual power of the 
Church — which is lodged exclusively in the hands of the pope, 
who stands in the place of God — has always served to ''re- 
mind men that the rights of the civil power are limited; that 
there are things beyond its province, cases in which a man 
may say, and ought to say, I will not obey." 7 

The application of this doctrine, as thus laid down by the 
" Holy Doctor," affirmed by Balmes, and stamped with pon- 
tifical sanction by Leo XIII, to the condition of affairs un- 
der our civil institutions, is plain and simple and easily un- 
derstood. It is unnecessary to repeat at this point the 
fundamental principles of our Government which Leo XIII, 
Pius IX, Gregory XVI, and numerous other popes have 
condemned and anathematized as heretical and violative of 
the divine law. According to their pontifical teachings — an- 
nounced ex cathedra from the "chair of St. Peter" — the 
American constitutions and laws which require obedience 
to any of these or to all of them, not only require "some- 
thing that is evil," but transcend the faculties of the Gov- 



f Balmes, p. 326. 



412 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

ernment by encroaching upon those which God has made to 
pertain exclusively to the Church, or to the pope as its di- 
vinely constituted head ! Therefore, according to Thomas 
Aquinas, to Balmes, to Leo XIII, and to the Jesuits, they 
are not to be obeyed, because " God, rather than man," 
must be obeyed. Leo XIII is not, of course, bound, as an 
alien and spiritual ruler of the Church, to obey them ; but 
by requiring that these doctrines shall be taught in all 
Roman Catholic schools in the United States, he assumes the 
spiritual and prerogative right to require of all in this 
country who obey his teachings, to violate their allegiance to 
the Government because it maintains these sinful and unjust 
constitutions and laws. This is perfectly logical — as palpable 
as that two and two make four. But Balmes — still follow- 
ing Thomas Aquinas — does not stop here. 

He repeats, that unjust laws are " not binding on con- 
science, unless for fear of creating scandal or causing greater 
evil ; that is to say, that, in certain cases, an unjust law may 
become obligatory, not by virtue of any duty which it imposes, 
but from motives of prudence ." 8 This reduces the obligation 
of obedience to the low standard of policy and expediency, 
and recognizes nothing whatsoever as due to the dignity or 
authority of the Government which exacts it. This doctrine 
is purely Jesuitical, and the method of stating it could 
scarcely have been improved upon by Loyola himself. No 
equivocal words are employed to disguise the actual mean- 
ing ; it is distinct and palpable. It is this, nothing more 
nor less : that if a human law, whether a constitution or 
a statute, is unjust because it violates the divine law, then 
they who so regard it may, by simulated obedience to it, 
compromise with injustice and wrong, and even sin, for the 
sake of some future advantage ! It is exactly as if it should 
be said to a nation or a State that its constitution and laws 
are heretical and atheistical because they violate the law of 
God, but that they will be submitted to only until the means 



8 Balmes, p. 328. 



JESUITICAL TEACHINGS. 413 

of setting them aside can be obtained. This doctrine, as ap- 
plied to such ordinary domestic laws of a State as relate to 
property and the general management of public affairs, is 
counteracted by the enforcement of such laws by the proper 
tribunals. But it is otherwise when the obnoxious provisions 
are embodied in fundamental principles, such as the separa- 
tion of Church and State, the freedom of religious belief, 
the popular source of all political power, and other prin- 
ciples upon which Government structures are based. In 
cases of this character — that is, where the principles are em- 
bodied in constitutions, and are thereby made fundamental — 
obedience becomes a mere cover to conceal the secret pur- 
pose of ultimate rebellion against them ; or, rather, of ulti- 
mate treason against the Government itself. It is a prac- 
tical exemplification of the demoralizing doctrine that "the 
means are justified by the end." This is the doctrine which 
the Jesuits openly and boldly inculcated in India and in China, 
when they became Brahmins and worshiped idols, and per- 
sisted in these unchristian practices in contemptuous defiance 
of the repeated mandates of the popes, until their absolute 
suppression and abolition became a necessity to the Church. 
But in these times and in this country, somewhat more of 
caution and circumspection is required, because, even where 
there is perfect freedom of religious belief, " motives of pru- 
dence " forbid that this un-American doctrine shall be openly 
proclaimed. The motive, however, that existed then is the 
same that exists now ; that is, to accomplish by indirection 
and stealth an ulterior end which "prudence" requires to 
be hypocritically concealed. It is these same prudential mo- 
tives which dictate that Protestantism shall be, for^ the time 
being, recognized as an existing and influential power, but 
with the secretly-cherished purpose to deal with it as an 
unjust and illegitimate power, subject to entire overthrow 
whensoever these " motives of prudence " shall exist no 
longer !" 

Thomas Aquinas announced his theological doctrines with 
perfect freedom, because in his time — the Middle Ages — - 



414 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the sovereignty of the popes was undisputed ; and Balraes 
was but little less restrained in repeating them in Spain 
when his great work was written. With neither of them 
were " motives of prudence" so controlling as they now are 
among those who accept their teachings in the United States. 
Therefore, Balmes was careful to point out the method of 
determining when laws and constitutions are so unjust that 
they may be covertly disobeyed, by evasion or otherwise, 
while ostensively acquiesced in. He says: "Laws may also 
be unjust in another point of view, when they are contrai^y 
to the will of God;" and "with respect to such laws it is not 
allowable, under any circumstances, to obey them" All Govern- 
ments guilty of the offense of enacting such laws are to be 
considered as having usurped faculties which do not belong 
to them, and are to be told flatly and unequivocally, when 
"prudence" will permit it: " Thy laws are not law*, but out- 
rages ; they are not binding in conscience ; and if, in some in- 
stances, thou art obeyed, it is not owing to any obligation, but to 
prudence." 9 

Applied practically, this papal and Jesuit doctrine amounts 
to this, under our civil institutions: that one who has taken 
the oath of allegiance to our Government is justified in not 
feeling under any obligation to obey the Constitution and 
laws, in their American sense and spirit, but only in so far 
as may comport with the ulterior purpose to violate both, to 
whatsoever extent their principles shall conflict with the di- 
vine law as defined by the pope. The proposition is easily 
illustrated. The Constitution confides to the Supreme Court 
of the United States the duty and authority to decide upon the 
validity of all our laws when they are alleged to be invalid. 
That tribunal has, ever since the beginning of the Govern- 
ment, recognized Church and State as separated, the abso- 
lute freedom of religious belief, and the people as the sov- 
ereign source of political power, all of which is obedient to 
the Constitution. Anything to the contrary would undoubt- 



9 Balmes, pp. 329-330. 



JESUITICAL TEACHINGS. 415 

edly be a step in the direction of upturning the Govern- 
ment and putting an end to the Republic. Yet this Jesuit 
doctrine, derived from the theological principles of Thomas 
Aquinas — which we are told are " revealed truth" — not only 
authorizes, but encourages as Christian duty, an appeal from 
the Supreme Court to the pope, and obedience to the latter 
instead of the former. Leo XIII, Pius IX, and Gregory 
XVI, in our own time, and many other popes before them, 
have decided — and the former holds himself in readiness to 
repeat the decision when necessary — that the Government 
has no rightful jurisdiction over matters which concern the 
Church or the papacy — whether that jurisdiction is conferred 
by the Constitution or by fundamental laws — but that they 
are exclusively within the circle of the pope's spiritual juris- 
diction. Upon the authority of this doctrine, therefore, Leo 
XIII, with the Jesuits to back him, proposes to obtain the 
mastery over the people by reversing the decisions of the 
Supreme Court ; and interferes with the working of our 
Government to the extent of instructing citizens of the 
United States that disobedience to certain of our fundamen- 
tal laws, as the Supreme Court has interpreted and the peo- 
ple understand them, is an absolute religious obligation, and 
that obedience to him is the service of God ! With entire 
unanimity the framers of the Government separated Church 
and State, and made that central and controlling among the 
principles which underlie it ; but Leo XIII solemnly avers, 
from his pontifical throne in Rome, that this violates the di- 
vine law, and is such " libertinism " as is leading society to 
ruin. Thus he brings himself in direct conflict with our in- 
stitutions, which would inevitably topple and fall if he were 
obeyed and his principles were substituted for ours. And, 
in order to secure the object he seeks after, he has com- 
manded that the doctrines of Thomas Aquinas shall be taught 
as "revealed truths "in all Roman Catholic colleges and 
schools, so that the children of all the Roman Catholic citi- 
zens of this country shall be so educated as to be prepared 
for the union of Church and State, and the subordination of 



416 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the latter to the former, whensoever " prudence " shall warrant 
him or his successors in commanding it. If this does not 
propose to erect an alien and antagonistic Government within 
ours, upon the principle that " the Church is not in the 
State, but the State in the Church," it would require the 
introduction into our language of a new set of words to tell 
its meaning. That it makes religion the pretext for grad- 
ually undermining our civil institutions, any man can see 
who has intelligence enough to travel away from home with- 
out an attendant. Those engaged in this work — no matter 
who they are or where — are the sappers and miners of an 
aggressive army. At the command of the pope and Jesuit 
general — both in Rome — they are striving, day and night, to 
reduce the whole body of our Roman Catholic population — 
from the bulk of whom they conceal their actual purpose — 
to the low and humiliating attitude of Jesuit emissaries, with 
no sentiments, opinions, or thoughts of their own, but the 
mere silent, passive, and uninquiring slaves of papal and 
imperial authority. 

After laying down the foregoing general propositions, 
based upon the teachings of the " Holy Doctor" and "Angel 
of the Schools," Balmes — guided by the same authority — 
proceeds to explain the circumstauces which justify resist- 
ance to the civil authoritv of Governments. In order to 
make himself explicit upon this important subject, he desig- 
nates a class of Governments which he calls de facto; that is, 
such as are formed by revolution against legitimate author- 
ity, and are able to maintain their existence against all op- 
position, like that of the United States. These, according 
to him, have no right to exact obedience to their civil au- 
thority or laws, merely because of the fact of their exist- 
ence. Not having been founded upon the principles of the 
divine law, as denned by the infallible popes, and, conse- 
quently, not being de jure, they are to be regarded as illegit- 
imate; and, on that account, no obligation of obedience to 
them, in so far as they violate the divine law, can be created 
even by an oath of allegiance. They are only to be obeyed 



JESUITICAL TEACHINGS. 417 

" from motives of prudence," until de jure or legitimate Gov- 
ernments can be substituted for them. In his view, a Gov- 
ernment which possesses the right to require and enforce 
obedience to its laws, must have the legitimate authority to 
command ; and this it can not acquire unless it conforms to 
the divine law as the pope shall define it. " Consummated 
facts " — that is, the actual existence of an independent de 
facto Government — can not confer this right, no matter how 
well and permanently established it may be. The period of 
its duration, whether long or short, is of no consequence ; 
for, by the Canon law doctrine of prescription, no length of 
time can be set up against the Church or the pope. Never- 
theless, as those who pay obedience to the pope are some- 
times compelled to live under the protection of what he calls 
de facto and not under de jure Governments, he recommends 
Jesuitical obedience to them although illegitimate, because 
" resistance would be useless," and " would only lead to new 
disorders." It must be observed, however, that this obedi- 
ence involves policy and expediency merely, and not the obli- 
gation of duty. It is only to be yielded when unavoidable, in 
consequence of the fact that the illegitimate authority is too 
strong and well-established to be overcome. It would be 
otherwise if it were too feeble to defend itself against ag- 
gression. And to enforce these doctrines and principles 
more thoroughly as religious dogmas, he states the fact that 
when the Archbishop of Palmyra wrote a book to prove 
" that the mere fact of a Government's existence is sufficient 
for enforcing the obedience of subjects," the " work was for- 
bidden at Rome," and placed, of course, upon the Prohibitory 
Index. 10 

He refers very sparingly to the methods of resisting ille- 
gitimate or de facto Governments. As the exponent of doc- 
trines approved by the Jesuits, the infallibility of the pope 
was accepted by him as the doctrine of the Church, although 
it had never been so decreed or accepted by the whole 



10 Balmes, p. 333. 

27 



418 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

Church. This was necessary to his main premise, which was 
that as the pope represented God on earth, all the power of 
the Church must, from necessity, be centered in him, so that 
whatsoever he declared the divine law to be must be assented 
to as such by all the faithful. If the pope possessed that power 
then, he possesses it more emphatically now, siuce his infal- 
libility has been made a part of the faith, and, therefore, all 
who accept that doctrine are bouud to do whatsoever he 
shall command with reference to submitting to or resisting the 
constitutions and laws of civil governments whensoever his 
jurisdiction, as he defines it, shall be invaded by them. Con- 
sequently, the true Church teaching is, that the pope alone is 
permitted, as the sole earthly interpreter of the divine law, to 
decide whether Governments are de jure or de facto, and what 
constitutions and laws are to be obeyed or disobeyed; and no 
appeal is allowed from his decision. With this final arbiter 
of the fate and destiny of nations constantly present to guide 
the faithful, through the agency of a vigilant and watchful 
hierarchy, the teachings of Thomas Aquinas, the Jesuits, and 
divers popes, they are required to cultivate, with the utmost 
diligence, the habit of obedience to papal authority, so as to 
keep themselves in constant preparation for future emergen- 
cies. What those emergencies shall be will depend upon 
the progressive Governments themselves, and, in this country, 
upon the people ; who should not, even seemingly, acquiesce 
in any measures of either Church or State, priests or lay- 
men, which shall unsettle or endanger any of the funda- 
mental principles upon which their civil institutions are 
planted. There is no room in this country which can be ap- 
propriated as a burial-place for popular government; but 
there is room for the still further outspreading of the influ- 
ences of the form of government which is now sending its 
light over the world, advancing civilization where it exists, 
and creating it where it does not. 

Gathering the papal doctrines from these sources, authori- 
tatively commanded by Leo XIII to be considered as the 
foundation of all Roman Catholic education, a man must 



JESUITICAL TEACHINGS. 419 

stultify himself not to see that the fundamental principles of 
our Government can not enter into and become a part of that 
education. The Roman Catholic youth are forbidden by the 
papal system from accepting as true the principles of the 
Declaration of Independence, or of the Constitution of the 
United States. Both of these instruments would have to be 
excluded from Roman Catholic schools, or the pope be dis- 
obeyed. Or if introduced there, the pupils would have to 
be taught that they contain irreligious principles, which the 
Church had always condemned, and still condemns. The 
Jesuit preceptor would tell them that the American Revolu- 
tion was a sin in itself, because it was rebellion against the 
existing principles of monarchical government, which alone 
have the divine approval ; that all men are not created free 
and equal, because some are born to command, and others 
to obey; that governments do not derive their just powers 
from the consent of the governed, but the multitude of the 
governed are bound to obey their superiors, and they the 
pope; and that when our fathers appealed to " Divine Prov- 
idence" for the support of our national independence, their 
appeal was blasphemous, because the pope, who represents 
God on earth, has anathematized the principles they have 
announced. And with the Declaration of Independence thus 
disposed of, they would be further instructed that the first 
article of the amendments to the Constitution is null and 
void, because it is the duty of the Government to establish 
the Roman Catholic religion by law,. inasmuch as it is the 
only true religion ever revealed, and the Protestant religions 
are false and heretical ; that these false religions ought to be 
prohibited by law, and that the freedom of speech and of 
the press should be so far restrained as not to allow the 
Roman Catholic religion to be assailed, the authority which 
the pope claims for himself to be questioned, or the Roman 
Catholic priesthood to be subjected, like other people, to 
obedience to the public laws. 

Upon the great work of building for themselves and us 
a Government based upon the Declaration of Independ- 



420 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

ence and the Constitution of the United States, our fathers 
entered, as we verily believe, under the protection of 
Divine Providence. Are we prepared to have the youth of 
this country taught that this is such delusion as can only 
exist in the minds of " the dreamers of unprofitable dreams?" 
Unless we are, we must discard the advice of any alien 
power, either spiritual or temporal, hostile to the progressive 
spirit which has thus far assured our growth and greatness, 
and promises still greater progress and development in the 
future. A century of experience has taught us that the 
founders of our Government were not only skillful builders, 
but wise and prudent counselors. When they shunned the 
pathways along which other nations had wrecked their for- 
tunes, they, as w r e believe, displayed a degree of wisdom 
never excelled in the previous history of the w r orld, by 
building up a system of secular government which centers 
in the hands of the people — a free, intelligent, and patriotic 
people — entire sovereignty over the laws. There can be no 
attack upon any material part of that system, without assail- 
ing this popular sovereignty, and denying to the people the 
right of self-government. 

When, therefore, we are told — as the Jesuits now tell 
us — that these secular institutions created by our fathers are 
sinful and heretical, because they violate the divine law as Leo 
XIII, Pius IX, and Gregory XVI, in our own time, and 
numerous other popes before them, have defined that law, we 
are confronted by the alternative of either resisting this as- 
sault in some effective method becoming to ourselves, or of 
consenting to the papal policy of retrogression, which pro- 
poses to lead us back into a condition of humiliating de- 
pendence upon an alien power which teaches that popular 
governments contravene the divine law, and have the curse 
of God resting upon them. We are no longer left to sur- 
mise this, or to draw inferences with regard to it, which 
may be ingeniously and Jesuitically met by the pretense 
that they proceed from Protestant prejudices. The doors 
have been thrown open so wide by our liberalism and tolera- 



JESUITICAL TEACHINGS. 421 

tion that the ultimate end which the papacy seeks after is not 
brooded over in silence as it formerly was, but is plainly and 
distinctly avowed, so that it will be our own fault if we fail 
to discover the points at which our civil institutions are as- 
sailed. 

Our Government has been so well and wisely constructed 
that it does not interfere, in any respect whatsoever, with 
the freedom of conscience. On the contrary, it is protected 
by constitutional guarantees, which we preserve with the 
most assiduous care. But the papal assailants of some of its 
most cherished principles avail themselves of this freedom to 
justify their united exertions to restore the temporal power 
of the pope, well knowing that if that can be accomplished 
so that his authority could be established here, as they de- 
sire it to be, he would exercise his prerogative right to deny 
this same freedom of conscience to all except those obedient 
to himself, and would arraign us at the bar of the Roman 
Curia, because under our constitutional guarantees we toler- 
ate all the varieties of religious belief. 

Without the least disguise, these same assailants openly 
declare their purpose not to slacken their efforts until our 
system of popular education is entirely uprooted from the 
foundation, and our public schools are converted into papal 
conventicles, where the disciples of Loyola shall have su- 
preme rule and be permitted to plant the principles and 
theological doctrines of Thomas Aquinas in every youthful 
mind. This accomplished, they would expect that the com- 
ing generations, instead of deriving patriotic instruction from 
the example of those who founded the Republic, would bow 
their heads in absolute and uninquiring obedience to all the 
doctrines and dogmas of the pope — substitute the decrees 
and encyclicals of the popes and the Canon law of Rome 
for the Constitution and laws of the United States — and, dis- 
carding entirely the admonitions of our Revolutionary fathers, 
would accept as infallibly true whatsoever the pope should 
declare concerning the relations between the spiritual and the 
temporal powers ; that is, between the Church and the State. 



422 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS, 

In this work of plucking out every germ of patriotism 
which instinctively grows and bears fruit in youthful minds, 
the Jesuits have been experts, ever since Julius III and 
Loyola established a college at Rome to teach treason to the 
German youth. Time and practice have increased their skill, 
and their disappointment at being compelled to* witness the 
triumph of Protestantism, while they have become fugitives 
among the nations, has intensified their hatred of all free 
and independent Governments. Leo XIII — not forgetful of 
his own early training — has signified his purpose to select 
them as the educators of American youth, so that they may 
be trained in the religious belief that our national independ- 
ence is leading us to "libertinism" and ruin; and that they 
can only serve God rightly by forgetting home and country, 
and by plucking out from their minds all sense of personal 
manhood and every ennobling quality ; so that, instead of 
becoming influential citizens of a free and progressive coun- 
try, they may fit themselves fbr "uninquiring obedience" to 
a foreign and alien power, as the Jesuits themselves have 
done. This country, so blessed by the abundant fruits of 
the Reformation and of popular government, must not be 
permitted to turn back to the old paths, which papal and 
imperial despotism has filled with pitfalls. The principles of 
the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the 
United States must not be supplanted by papal and Jesuit 
dogmas — such as have been set forth by the ambitious popes 
and by Loyola, in order to secure the complete triumph of 
monarchism over popular liberty. 

The sentiment of patriotism is well-nigh universal among 
the people of the United States — Roman Catholics as well as 
Protestants. The former have the same desire as the latter 
to participate in making the laws that govern them. Their 
Italian brethren had this desire so intensely that they re- 
sorted to revolution, and thus secured it in the only possible 
way by abolishing the pope's temporal power. Why, then, 
should they be urged, with such untiring tenacity, to restore 
again this temporal power and revive its evils? Why should 



JESUITICAL TEACHINGS. 423 

it be demanded of them that they organize into a politico- 
religious party, obedient to a papal envoy from Rome, and 
pledged under the solemn obligations of religious duty to 
reverse the judgment of their Italian brethren, and fasten 
upon them a burden they have thrown off? Why should 
they be required to accept a religion which teaches that man- 
kind are by nature unequal, with some born for dominion and 
the multitude for obedience only? Why should they be 
commanded to treat as sinful and heretical civil institutions 
which now protect them and increase their temporal happi- 
ness? Why should it be continually sounded in their ears 
that the divorce of the State from the Church, religious lib- 
erty, the freedom of speech and of the press, are such 
offenses against the divine law as must not be condoned in 
this life, and will not be forgiven in the next? 

These questions are not idle, but are full of meaning to 
those to whom they are addressed, and could be multiplied 
almost indefinitely. They are sufficiently suggestive to 
show — what there are few so blind as not to see — that the 
existing agitation about the rights of the Church, and the 
passionate declamation employed by the Jesuits to maintain 
it, have but a single object — the re-conversion of the pope 
into a temporal and imperial ruler of the Italian people, 
against their consent. This — with these agitators — must be 
accomplished at every hazard, no matter what other conse- 
quences may follow. It is inculcated as religious duty, which 
can not be neglected without disobeying God! All the obe- 
dient, therefore, are commanded to take part in it, in disre- 
gard of all human laws forbidding the people of one nation 
from interfering with the domestic affairs of another. The 
reverend author of the pope's biography — speaking for and 
by the express authority of Leo XIII himself — says that the 
abolition of the temporal power "is an international wrong 
which all Catholics are bound to denounce and oppose until 
it is done away with." 11 This is the command of the pope, 



11 Life of Leo XIII. By O'Reilly. Page 471. 



424 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

authoritatively uttered in imperial tones. It is sent out to 
all the Roman Catholics throughout the world, who are re- 
quired by it to defy the laws of the countries which protect 
them, because they are mere human laws, and to restore 
absolute monarchism to the pope, because the divine law 
provides that mankind shall be ruled by kings and not by 
themselves. 

The Roman Catholic part of our population are seem- 
ingly content as they are, in their peaceful aud quiet homes, 
where, with their wives and children around them, they are 
secured by Protestant laws in the right to worship God un- 
molested and according to their own consciences, as well as 
in their pursuit after happiness and prosperity. Are they 
prepared to place all this in jeopardy, to minister to the pride 
and vanity of those who assume to be their rulers, who know 
nothing of domestic joys, or peaceful homes, or such sym- 
pathetic affections as grow out of the tenderest relations of 
life, or of the laughter and chattering of innocent children, 
which make the heart glad? All the means that learning 
and eloquence and authority can employ will be invoked to 
make them so; and it is considered one of the most effectual 
of these to instruct them — as the pope's biographer does 
with singular complacency — that the Church at Rome has 
been always found upon the side of free thought in religion 
and popular self-government in civil affairs! And to main- 
tain this marvelous assertion, he boastingly claims that the 
great English Magna Oiaiia — the foundation of our civil and 
religious liberty — was written "with a Catholic pen f ' 12 when 
he must have known, and undoubtedly did know, that In- 
nocent III — who claimed, as Leo XIII does, to be "God's 
vicegerent," with the apostolic power to build and destroy 
nations, to plant and overthrow kingdoms — cursed and 
anathematized that charter because, as he said, it violated the 
divine law; declared it to be null and void for that reason; 
excommunicated its authors and defenders as heretics; and 



12 Life of Leo XIII. By O'Reilly. Page 409. 



JESUITICAL TEACHINGS. 425 

said that if that charter had been carried to Rome it would have 
been consumed in flames kindled by a common hangman, as 
would also have been the bodies of the earls and barons who 
extorted it from a craven-hearted king. The decree abolish- 
ing the temporal power of the pope was also written by a 
Catholic pen. 

Nevertheless, it is true — and no fair-minded man will 
deny it — that there have been multitudes of Roman Cath- 
olics in all parts of the world who have been intense lovers 
of civil and religious liberty, and who have defended their 
cause with courage and fidelity. There are many of these 
in the United States — men who every day feel the warm and 
friendly grasp of Protestant hands. With all patriotic Amer- 
icans the welfare of these is close akin to their own. But 
how many of these have been found upon the papal throne, 
or among those who claim the divine right to dictate the re- 
ligion of the world, and. exact implicit obedience from its 
professors? The echo which comes back from the pages of 
history is — How many? If Leo XIII is one of them, the 
announcement of a fact so important to the world should 
come from himself, not from others who exhibit no letter of 
authority which commissions them to retract, in his name, 
his well-matured and frequently-expressed official opinions. 
If he has — now that his mind has become matured by the 
reflections of a long and well-spent 'life — found that the sep- 
aration of Church and State and the freedom of religious be- 
lief are not violative of the divine law; if he has become 
convinced that a government " for the people, of the people, 
and by the people," like that of the United States, is not 
heretical, — then let the announcement of these facts come di- 
rectly and authoritatively from the Vatican. There are multi- 
tudes of Roman Catholics in this country whose hearts would 
leap with intense joy at such an announcement, and Protest- 
ants would hail it as a sure harbinger of future concord, 
peace, and quiet among all classes of professing Christians, 
such as existed among the Protestants and Roman Catholics 
of Germany before the social atmosphere was contaminated 



426 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

by the poison of Jesuitism. Thousands who are inclined to 
acknowledge the pope's authority over their consciences, 
within the proper circle of his spiritual domain, would prize 
an encyclical to that effect, as if each letter were of gold or 
precious stones, because it would prove to the world that 
Pius IX was moved only by his own impulsive nature and 
excited imagination when he declared that the papacy could 
not become reconciled to, "and agree with, progress, liberal- 
ism, and civilization " as they prevail among the modern na- 
tions. But until this has been done — regularly and author- 
itatively — he must be judged alone by the record he has 
made, and of which his enthusiastic admirers boast as if every 
word uttered by him was written with the pen of an angel. 
If the Protestants of the United States still find in these 
either an open or concealed attack upon the most cherished 
principles of their Government — the separation of the State 
from the Church, the freedom of r.eligious belief, of speech, 
and of the press, the popular right of self-government — they 
can not be rightfully accused of intolerance when they an- 
nounce their determination to stand by and maintain these 
principles to the last. This they must and will do, as their 
fathers did before, against all the combined powers of the 
world, no matter from what arsenals their adversaries shall 
draw their weapons. Nor should they forget that "eternal 
vigilance is the price of liberty." 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

PAPAL INFALLIBILITY. 

Theee are few things so important to the people of the 
United States as that they shall intelligently understand 
what consequences will inevitably follow the successful ter- 
mination of Mgr. Satolli's mission to this country in his ca- 
pacity of deputy-pope. If he shall succeed in breaking down 
our system of common schools, or in drawing away from 
them all the children of our Roman Catholic citizens, and in 
the general or partial substitution of the papal for the Amer- 
ican system of education, what will follow? There is but 
one answer to this question, which is, that religion will be 
taught in the schools ; not the religion of Christ, or the 
apostles, or the martyrs, or that which prevailed throughout 
the Christian world for the first five hundred years of our 
era — up till the fall of the Roman Empire — but that which 
originated in the ambition of emperors and popes, and cul- 
minated in such a union of Church and State as required 
that the popes should be temporal monarchs, with plenary 
power to rule over the consciences of mankind. That is 
what Leo XIII is striving after, and what he has sent Mgr. 
Satolli to the United States to accomplish. And it was to 
achieve this that Pius VII united with the arbitrary mon- 
archs of the a Holy Alliance," and re-established the Jesuits; 
and Pius IX forced through the Vatican Council of 1870 
the decree which declares that all the popes who have ever 
lived and all who shall hereafter live, are, and must be, ab- 
solutely infallible. This doctrine of papal infallibility, there- 
fore, is hereafter to constitute the great fundamental feature 
in every system of Roman Catholic education, the central 
fact from which all intellectual culture shall radiate, as the 

427 



428 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

rays of light do from the sun. What it is requires no learn- 
ing to explain, and what effect it would have upon our in- 
stitutions, if taught in all our schools, it does not require the 
spirit of prophecy to foretell. That it would undermine and 
destroy them is as palpable as that poison diffused through- 
out the body will, if not removed, produce death. 

The struggle between the popes — that is, the papacy — 
and the Church as an organized body of Christian people, 
for a conciliar decree of the pope's infallibility, was continued 
through a period of more than a thousand years, during 
which some popes exercised it without authority as a cover 
for persecution, and to justify their unlimited ambition ; 
others to assure themselves of impunity in the commission 
of enormous crimes ; while others, influenced by honest Chris- 
tian instinct and sentiment, repudiated and condemned it as 
demoralizing and antichristian. The Church suffered most 
when this struggle was at its highest, as is evidenced by the 
seventy years' residence of the popes at Avignon; the forty 
years' schism ; the claim of the pontifical seat by John XXII, 
Gregory XII, and Benedict XIII, at the same time ; the 
imprisonment of John XXII by the Council of Constance ; 
the burning of Huss and Jerome at the stake ; and the gen- 
eral demoralization of the clergy, to say nothing of other 
things with which all intelligent readers of ecclesiastical his- 
tory are familiar. When the Church recovered from these 
and other afflictions, it would be tedious to enumerate ; it 
was done by the influence of the good and unambitious popes, 
together with that of the great body of its membership, who 
combined to rebuke the claim of infallibility, because it was 
founded upon the vain assumption that a mere man, with 
the passions and impulses of other men, was the equal of 
God in wisdom and authority. 

When this decree was obtained by Pius IX from the 
Vatican Council, twenty-three years ago, the Jesuits won 
their proudest triumph since their restoration. It made no 
difference with them, or with Pius IX, or with their obedi- 
ent followers, that Clement XIV was decreed to have been also 



PAPAL INFALLIBILITY. 429 

infallible when he suppressed them by a solemn pontifical 
decree, reciting how they had disturbed the peace of the 
Church and of the nations by their multitude of iniquities, nor 
how one act of infallibility could be set aside and abrogated 
by another. Not even a single thought was incited by so 
inconsequential a matter as this, because everything was 
centered in the great object of achieving a triumph over 
liberalism and modern progress, upon the Jesuit theory 
that "the end justifies the means." Pius IX was present in 
the Council, and one of the enthusiastic defenders of the 
decree afterwards gave full vent to his extraordinary imag- 
inings by declaring that the souls of all present were " over- 
whelmed by the brilliant effulgence of the sun of righteous- 
ness and eternal truth, reflected to-day from one greater 
than Moses, the very vicar of Christ Jesus himself." 1 It is 
not surprising that an author like this should have become 
the historian of such a Council, but it is a little so that his 
book should have been published in this country about two 
years after, in a form so cheap as to assure it a large circula- 
tion among our Roman Catholic population. The motive of 
this, however, manifestly was that the volume should be- 
come educational in the papal schools, to take the place of the 
histories which point out the advantages we have derived 
from Protestantism, and at the same time stamp the impres- 
sion upon the minds of old and young, that the pope, as the 
only guardian and dictator of true Christian faith is and 
must continue to be — no matter whether as a man he pos- 
sesses good qualities or bad — a " greater man than Moses/' 
because he is infallible and Moses was not. This character 
of the work is well established by the fact that, among the 
deplorable evils of the times, it specifies the usurpation of 
the education of youth "by unbelieving seculars;" that is, 
by those who, notwithstanding their professions, know noth- 
ing of true religion because they are Protestants ; and by the 
further fact that the chief remedy for these evils pointed out 



The Council of the Vatican. By Thomas Canon Pope. Page 272. 



430 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

by him is the establishment of the " pope's sovereign power 
over the world;" and by the still additional fact that, 
when referring to those Roman Catholics who live under the 
protection of Protestant institutions, he adds: "The Church 
has ever regarded it as a matter of importance that the laws 
of those civil powers, to which her spiritual children are sub- 
jected, should be formed in perfect accordance with her own 
laws;" 2 that is, that as the pope has at last, after more than 
a thousand years of hard struggle, been decreed to be infal- 
lible, they shall not be considered by "the faithful" as bind- 
ing upon their consciences unless approved by him. And 
then, establishing it as the foundation-stone upon which the 
superstructure of the papal system rests, that the Church 
"has ever proved herself the most powerful bulwark of the 
temporal power of temporal princes," he proceeds to instruct 
those who had not then learned what was meant by the 
pope's infallibility, in what sense the Church expected them 
to accept it. His words should sink deeply into the mind of 
every citizen of this country who desires to know what prin- 
ciples of government would be instilled into the minds of 
American youth if Mgr. Satolli and his Jesuit allies should 
succeed in destroying our common schools, and substituting 
for them parochial or religious schools. Here is what he 
says : 

"The Church may not wish to iuterefere in the purely 
secular concerns of other States, or in the enactment of 
purely secular laws, for the government of foreign subjects, 
but she claims a right, and a right divine, to prevent any secu- 
lar law, or power, being exercised for the injury of religion, the 
destruction of morals, and the spiritual ruin of her children. She 
claims a right to supervise such laws, to support their use, if sal- 
utary, to control their abuse. In the domain of morals, it is the 
province of the Church to reign. Wherever there is moral re- 
sponsibility, it is her prerogative, by divine commission, to 



2 The Council of the Vatican. By Thomas Canon Pope. Page 10. 



PAPAL INFALLIBILITY. 431 

guide and to govern, to sanction, to command, or to con- 
demn, to reward merit, and to punish moral delinquency." 3 

And, in further definition of infallibility, he says: 

"The Council will vindicate its authority over the world, 
and prove its right, founded on a divine commission, to enter 
most intimately into all the spiritual concerns of the world; to 
supervise the acts of the king, the diplomatist, the philoso- 
pher, and the general; to circumscribe the limits of their 
speculative inquiries ; to hold up the lamp which is to light (heir 
only path to knowledge and education ; to subjugate human rea- 
son to the yoke of faith; to extinguish liberals, rationalists, and 
deists by one stroke of her infallibility. Infallible dogma is a 
brilliant light, which every intellect must recognize, whether 
willingly or reluctantly. . . . The Church claims its right 
to enter the world's domain, and recognizes no limits but the cir- 
cumference of Christendom ; to enforce her laws over her subjects ; 
to control tlieir reason and judgment; to guide their morals, their 
thoughts, words, and actions, and to regard temporal sover- 
eigns, though entitled to exercise power in secular affairs, as 
auxiliaries and subordinates to the attainment of the end of 
her institution, the glory of God and the salvation of the 
immortal souls of men, and to secure for them their ever- 
lasting happiness. And this order of things she regards as 
true liberty — Ubi Spiritus Domini ibi libertas." 

He insists that the Church has the right to intrude f( into 
the social relations of the general community of worldings;" and 
has also the " right to supervise the lectures of the professor, the 
diplomacy of the statesman, the government of kings, and to scru- 
tinize their morality and punish their faults" 

Referring to the union of Church and State, and tbe 
manner in which politico-religious opinions are brought within 
the papal jurisdiction, he says: 

"Political theorists nowadays presume so far as to pro- 
claim the right of secular States to be what they call free 



8 The Council of the Vatican, By Thomas Canon Pope. Page 11. 



432 FOOTPRINTS OF TEE JESUITS. 

and independent of the Church's laws ; that is, they profess 
to take their temporal governments out of the Church in which 
God intended to place and to bless them, and to consecrate 
them in and through the Church. There are even those who 
have the temerity to advocate the deordination of a Church 
dependent on the legislative enactments of a secular State ! 
Statesmen know the objects of your trausitory existence : it 
is to enact secular laws, for secular jurisprudence, and for 
the secular commonweal, and then to live in the Church ; to 
co-operate with the Church ; to be sanctified through the 
Church; and by this happy union to enjoy the reciprocity of 
the Church's influence over the consciences of your subjects, 
which is the solid foundation of their loyalty and your sta- 
bility ; and to assist the Church in promoting what is useful 
for saving their souls, which should be to you also an object 
of paramount solicitude. Is the world, then, come to this! — 
that social diplomatists should sever the State from the Church, 
or domineer over Christian society? Is nature to separate 
from grace, and set up a dynasty for itself? No, no; Quis 
separabit f The holy alliance of Church and State constitutes the 
union of the soul and body — the life and vigor of Christian so- 
ciety! It is time that a General Council shall teach states- 
men this salutary lesson, and that they may not put their 
foot on the steps of Peter's throne ; that it is- the^r duty to 
co-operate with the Church ; and that in all matters apper- 
taining to the order of grace, their position is, to sit down and 
listen respectfully before the Church's teaching chair." * 

Nothing short of the importance of the matters involved 
in the doctrine of the pope's infallibility, and the conse- 
quences which are expected to follow it, can justify such 
lengthy extracts from a single book. But these considera- 
tions do, for the reason that as books like this are seen by 
few, and read by still fewer, a better opportunity for under- 
standing the objects to be accomplished by them is furnished 



4 The Council of the Vatican. By Thomas Canon Pope. Pages 
12 to 15. 



PAPAL INFALLIBILITY. 433 

by this method to both Protestants and Roman Catholics. 
Multitudes of the latter are deceived and misled into the be- 
lief that the doctrine of the pope's infallibility is necessary to 
the Church, whose Christian teachings they revere ; whereas, 
if they, by intelligent instruction and thoughtful reflection, 
were assured, as the fact really is, that it pertains alone to 
the power and authority of the popes — that is, to the papacy, 
and not the Church — it is believed they would neither as- 
sent to it themselves, nor allow it to be taught, as a neces- 
sary dogma of faith, to their children, either in schools under 
the auspices of the Church or elsewhere. It would be un- 
fair to them to doubt that they would reject it, if assured, 
as these extracts would assure them, that infallibility re- 
quires the destruction of every form of popular government 
in order that a grand papal confederation may be constructed 
for the government of the world, under the sole dominion 
of the pope. They would, upon proper investigation, see 
and know that the Council which passed the decree was not 
a representative body with authority to bind their con- 
sciences, but that it was, on the other hand, composed of 
those who were indebted alone to the pope for all the author- 
ity they possessed, and that he could strip them' of their 
robes at his own pleasure in case of disobedience to his 
commands. And they would learn also that instead of the 
decree having been passed unanimously by the whole Coun- 
cil — as they have been instructed — there were 157 absentees, 
who withdrew because of it, leaving those only to vote who 
were in its favor; that, in point of fact, it was a conflict 
between the Church, as it had existed under more than 250 
popes before Pius IX, and the papacy, and that the victory 
was won by the latter, to the discomfiture and regret of vast 
multitudes of their devout Christian brethren in all parts of 
the world. The Council consisted of 692 members. There 
were but 535 present when the decree was passed, showing, as 
stated, 157 absent. Of these, 63 of the diocesan bishops and 
representatives of what are called " the most illustrious sees 
in Christendom," signed a written protest against papal infal- 

28 



434 FO TPRIN TS OF THE JES UITS. 

libility. Of those present, 533 voted for the decree, and 
2 against it — one of whom was from the United States — but 
these were so carried away by the excitement that they gave 
in their adhesion. Many of the absentees had left Rome in 
disgust, having signified their opposition before leaving. On 
the day of the vote, there were 66 in Rome who refused to 
attend the session. Among these were 4 cardinals, 2 patri- 
archs, 2 primates, 18 archbishops, and the remainder were 
bishops. The result, consequently, was a mere triumph of 
the majority over the minority, as occurs in legislative 
bodies. The pretense of unanimity is without foundation, 
except as regards the votes actually cast. To compare 
a result thus obtained to the direct intervention of Provi- 
dence, in imitation of the delivery of the law to Moses, in- 
dicates the possession of an exceedingly high faculty of in- 
vention ; it borders closely upon delusion. Therefore, it may 
well and appropriately be said that the description of the 
scene by the author, from whose book the foregoing quota- 
tions are extracted, has, in calling Pius IX "greater than 
Moses, the very vicar of Christ Jesus himself," so far tran- 
scended the bounds of reason as to make their author ap- 
pear like one who lives only in an ethereal atmosphere. 
There is no authority for saying that he is a Jesuit; but if 
he were found in companionship with one known to be so, it 
would be puzzling to tell which was " the twin Dromio," be- 
cause, beyond all doubt, they would be " two Dromios, one 
in semblance." 

What was expected to be accomplished by the decree of 
the pope's infallibility, by solemnly declaring that God had 
but one representative upon earth, and that he was so en- 
dowed with divine wisdom that he alone could prescribe the 
universal rule of faith, and was endowed with sufficient au- 
thority to enable him to exact and enforce obedience to his 
commands? Let the thoughtful mind, desirous to obtain a 
satisfactory answer to this question, ponder w 7 ell upon the 
teachings of universal history — the birth, growth, and decay 
of former nations. Upon innumerable pages he will find it 



PAPAL INFALLIBILITY. 435 

written, more indelibly than if it had been carved upon metal 
by the engraver's tool, that, from the very beginning of the 
Christian Church at Rome — whensoever that was — papal in- 
fallibility had never been recognized or established as a 
dogma of religious faith. If the Apostle Peter was the first 
of the popes — as alleged — then, up till the pontificate of Pius 
IX, there were two hundred and fifty-eight popes, to say 
nothing of the numerous anti-popes. There were, besides, 
numerous General and Provincial Councils, beginning with 
that at Nice, under Constantine, in 325, and ending with 
that of the Vatican, in 1870 — the period between the two 
being one thousand five hundred and forty-five years. And 
yet, during all this long, protracted period, there is not to be 
found, among the articles of religious faith announced from 
time to time by the Church, one single sentence or word or 
syllable which requires it to be believed that the pope is infal- 
lible ! Is all this history mythical? Has it led " the faith- 
ful " into error and sin ? Were only those popes obedient to 
the divine law who believed themselves infallible, and acted 
accordingly, while those who did not were heretics? Why 
were General Councils necessary to obtain the universal con- 
sent of the Church, if the popes were infallible and could de- 
cree the faith of their own accord? When popes disagreed — 
as did John XXII and Nicholas III and Innocent III and 
Celestine and Pelagius and Gregory the Great — upon impor- 
tant questions, how were they to be decided ? 5 Were the 
popes who denied their own infallibility destined to be cut off 
in eternity from the presence of God for their heresy ? 
Edgar enumerates eight of these who directly disaffirmed 
their belief in it, 6 and there were many others who did not 
affirm it. Were all these heretics ? And were also the great 
Church historians, such as Launoy, Almain, Marca, Du Pin, 
Bossuet, and others — and the whole body of French or Cis- 
alpine Christians — all heretics ? And what is to be said of 



5 Ecclesiastical History. By Du Pin. Vol. XV-XVI, p. 263. 

6 Variations of Popery. By Edgar. Page 188. 



436 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

the General Councils of Pisa, Constance, and Basel, all three 
of which denied the pope's infallibility in terms of strong 
condemnation ? It would be easy to multiply these questions ; 
but it is sufficient to say that if the popes who denied infal- 
libility were heretics, then the line of apostolic succession is 
broken by the removal of several important links in the chain, 
aud the attempt to trace back the present Roman Church to 
the apostolic times, and to the Apostle Peter, is an entire and 
humiliating failure. And it is an unavoidable inference from 
a long line of facts, well proved in history, that but for the 
unfortunate alliance between the ambitious popes and the 
Jesuits to build up and strengthen their power at the ex- 
pense of the Church, the Christian world of the present day 
would have taken no interest in the prosecution of that in- 
quiry. The Church is of less consequence to the Jesuits than 
their own society, and as they have invariably condemned it 
when not upon their side, so there has been no time since the 
death of Loyola when they did not consider its humiliation 
by them as promotive of " the greater glory of God," when 
thereby their own power and authority could be enlarged. 

When Pius IX, in 1854, signalized the close of the eighth 
year of his pontificate by issuing his decree to the effect that 
thenceforward the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin 
Mary should be accepted as a dogma of faith; he acted of 
his own accord and without convening a General Council. 
It is fair to say, therefore, that he considered this an act of 
infallibility, then, for the first time, put in practical execu- 
tion. It was, doubtless, an experiment, practiced with the 
view to ascertain whether or no it would obtain the approba- 
tion of those whose consciences were to be influenced by it. 
The experiment was successful, and inasmuch as it involved 
only a question purely of a religions character, no special or 
injurious consequences followed. Protestants did not regard 
themselves warranted to complain of it, for the plain reason 
that the religious faith of Roman Catholics concerned them, 
selves alone. Pius IX, however, intended by this decree 
something more than merely to add a new dogma to the faith. 



PAPAL INFALLIBILITY. 437 

Undoubtedly, his object was to employ this exercise of infal- 
lible power, so that, if accepted with unanimity by the mem- 
bership of the Church, that might be considered such an in- 
dorsement of the doctrine as would justify him in convening 
a General Council, and having it decree that, not himself 
alone, but all other popes, both good and bad, were infallible. 
This is not said reproachfully, but rather to indicate the 
shrewdness and sagacity practiced by him to influence the 
large body of believers in the Church. The whole history 
of the papacy at that time proved that it was essential to 
its future success that the doctrine of infallibility should be 
extended beyond mere questions of religious belief, so as to 
embrace other matters connected with the revolutionary 
movements then in progress in Europe, which were threaten- 
ing to undermine, if not destroy, the papal power ; that is, 
the temporal power of the pope. Revolutionary disturbances 
are always threatening to those against whom they are di- 
rected, and Pius IX, believing, as he undoubtedly did, that 
such as then existed in Europe were directed, or would be if 
not checked, against his temporal power, deemed it necessary 
to obtain, if possible, the sanction of a conciliar decree to 
the exercise by him of new powers in addition to those then 
universally conceded to him over religious questions aud af- 
fairs. Thus he designed to obtain the express or implied as- 
sent of the Church to his exercise of jurisdiction over politico- 
religious matters, in order that he might be enabled to 
promulgate such decrees as would, through the agency and 
influence of "the faithful" among the different European 
nations, arrest the progress of the revolutionary movements, 
and save his temporal power. Hence, when the decree of 
infallibility was interpreted by him in the light of these 
events and his own purposes, he had no difficulty in con- 
cluding that it had given him jurisdiction over all such 
politico-religious questions as bore, either directly or indirectly, 
upon the spiritual or temporal interests of the Church in all 
parts of the world. That his successor, Leo XIII, agrees 
with him in this interpretation no intelligent man can deny. 



438 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

If he were not influenced to do this by his desire to regain 
the temporal power which was takeu away from his predeces- 
sor, his education and training by the Jesuits would impress 
his mind with the conviction that a temporal crown upon his 
head is a positive necessity, in order that he may promote 
"the greater glory of God." Consequently, when it is thus 
made too plain and palpable to admit of fair denial, that the 
infallibility of the pope is the chiefest and most fundamental 
dogma of faith — the foundation of the whole system of papal 
belief — it is positively obligatory upon us, in this country, to 
understand its full import and meaning. If anything were 
required to make this obligation more binding than it is, it is 
found in the facts now confronting us, that our public schools 
are pronounced " godless" because this religious dogma is not 
taught to our children, and that it is taught to Roman Cath- 
olic children in parochial schools, mainly uuder Jesuit control. 

Tedious as the evidence already adduced may seem to be 
to those who look at such matters as these only by casual 
glances, it is indispensable to a thorough knowledge of the 
truth that the politico-religious matters which this decree has 
brought within the jurisdiction of the pope should be plainly 
and distinctly made known. Without this knowledge, our 
tolerance may seem to invite dangerous encroachments, by 
the Jesuits and those obedient to them, upon some of the 
most highly cherished principles of our Government. We 
have seen, from one papal author, what is meant at Rome by 
a religious education, and shall, in the next chapter, see cumu- 
lative proof from another, probably more influential. 

From this latter author, even more distinctly than from 
the former, we shall see how absolutely we should be subject 
to the commands of the pope; how we should be domineered 
over by his ecclesiastical hierarchy and their Jesuit allies ; 
how all our actions, thoughts, and impulses, would be held 
in obedience to ecclesiastical and monarchical dictation ; and 
how we should have, instead of a Government of the people, 
one under the arbitrary dictatorship of a foreign sovereign, 
who can neither speak our language nor understand our Con- 



PAPAL INFALLIBILITY. 439 

stitution and laws. We might be permitted to manage our 
secular affairs — such as relate to the transaction of our ordi- 
nary business — but in everything we should consider as per- 
taining to the Church or himself, he would become our abso- 
lute and irresponsible ruler. Church and State would be 
united, and all the measures provided by the framers of our 
Government for the protection of our natural rights — such as 
the freedom of religious belief, of the press, and of speech — 
would be destroyed. Free government would be at an end, 
and a threatening cloud would hover over us like the pall of 
death. We should be turned back to the Middle Ages, and 
all the fruits of the Reformation would be lost, without the 
probability of ever being afterwards regained by our poster- 
ity. A careful scanning of what follows will show that this 
picture is not overdrawn. And if it is not, the obligation 
to see that these calamities shall not befall us, rests as heavily 
upon the Roman Catholic as it does upon the Protestant part 
of our population. A common spirit should animate the 
hearts of all, no matter what their religious belief, and stim- 
ulate them to joint protest and mutual defense. Those who 
brave the dangers of navigation upon the same vessel at sea, 
must, when the storm rages, unite together in heart and 
hand, or run the risk of sinking in a watery grave. So it is 
with those whose lives and fortunes and earthly interests are 
under the protection of the same civil institutions ; if they 
become divided into angry and adverse factions, under the 
dominion of unrestrained passions, they invite the spoiler to 
undermine the foundations of the fortress which shelters and 
protects them. 

That the Jesuits, in the war they are now making, and 
have always made, against civil and religious liberty, consti- 
tute such a spoiler, history attests in numerous volumes. 
Weresoever civil g overnment has been made obedient to the 
popular will, they have labored indefatigably for its over- 
throw. To that end monarchism has been made the central 
and controlling principle of their organization — so completely 
so that their society never has existed, and could not exist, 



440 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

without it. They warred malevolently upon the best of the 
popes, and defied the authority of the Church for more than 
a hundred years — never abating their vengeance, except 
when the pontifical chair was occupied by a pope who sub- 
mitted to their dictation. They are, to-day — as at every 
hour since the time of Loyola — compactly united to destroy, 
as sinful and heretical, all civil institutions constructed by 
the people for their own protection, and substitute for them 
such as are obedient to monarchs and their own interpreta- 
tion of the divine law. And now, when the pontifical au- 
thority is vested in a pope whose youthful mind was im- 
pressed and disciplined by their teachings, and they stand 
ready to subvert every Government which has separated the 
State from the Church, and secured the freedom of conscience, 
of speech, and of the press, and are straining every nerve 
to obtain the control of our system of common-school educa- 
tion, so as to instill their doctrines into the minds of the 
American youth — the times have become such that all the 
citizens of the United States, irrespective of their forms of 
religious belief, should form a solid and united body in re- 
sistance to their un-American plottings. 

Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, who signed our Declara- 
tion of Independence, was a Roman Catholic, but not a Jesuit. 
He loved his Church, and adhered to its faith, which did not 
then require him to believe that its pope was infallible; and 
with his mind filled with patriotic emotions, he stood by the 
side of Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and fifty- four 
other patriots, and united with them in separating Church 
and State, in establishing a Government of the people, in 
guaranteeing the absolute freedom of religious belief; and 
when he and they looked upon the great work they had ac- 
complished, they solemnly declared that it was in obedience 
to " the laws of nature and of nature's God." He who now 
insists, as the Jesuits do, that in all this he violated his Chris- 
tian conscience by offending God in the perpetration of an 
act of heresy, not only asperses unjustly the memory of this 



PAPAL INFALLIBILITY. 441 

unselfish patriot, but wounds the sensibilities of every true 
American heart. At the time our independence was estab- 
lished Pius VI was pope. He had not been declared to be 
infallible, and the Jesuits did not exist as a society under the 
protection of the Church; for they had been suppressed for 
their innumerable offenses against the Church and the na- 
tions, by his immediate predecessor Clement XIV, and were 
wanderers over the earth, seeking shelter under heretical 
princes and States, where they were allowed to plot against 
the Church. The pope, therefore, possessing only spiritual 
jurisdiction, did not pronounce a pontifical curse upon our 
infant institutions, not only because they were not within 
that jurisdiction, but because they secured, by proper guar- 
antees, the freedom of religious belief to Roman Catholics. 
He had his hands full in attempting to deal with the French 
Revolution, over which he supposed his jurisdiction to extend, 
because France had, for several centuries, recognized the 
spiritual dominion of his predecessors and their right to 
regulate its faith. Consequently, he took the side of Louis 
XVI against the people of France, and denounced the Legis- 
lative Assembly, and avowed his purpose to maintain all the 
prerogative rights of the "Holy See." He, accordingly, * 
issued an encyclical proclamation, in which he condemned 
the efforts of the French people to establish a Republic, and 
the Legislative Assembly, in these words: "That Assembly, 
after abolishing monarchy, which is the most natural form of 
government, had attributed almost all power to the populace, 
who follow no wisdom and no counsel, and have no understanding 
of things." He further instructed the bishops that all "poi- 
soned books" should be removed "from the hands of the 
faithful by force and by stratagem." He declared that "the 
priesthood and tyranny support each other; and the one over- 
thrown, the other can not long subsist." He denounced the 
liberty after which France was striving, in imitation of our 
Revolutionary example, as tending "to corrupt minds, per- 
vert morals, and overthrow all order in affairs and laws," 



442 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

and the equality of man as leading to "anarchy" and the 
"speedy dissolution" of society. 7 

And inasmuch as this same pope, Pius VI and the pres- 
ent pope, Leo XIII, have been solemnly decreed to be in- 
fallible, incapable of error in matters of faith, and standing 
in the place of God upon earth — and Leo XIII has never 
repudiated these teachings of Pius VI or many others of like 
import by other popes — and the decree of infallibility has so 
enlarged his spiritual jurisdiction as to bring all politico-re- 
ligious matters throughout the world within its circle, and 
the Jesuits have been re-established under their original con- 
stitution as it came from the hands of Loyola, and are still 
full of life and vigor, which they constantly display in their 
tireless efforts to control the education of American youth, 
the obligation imposed upon all our people, of every religious 
creed, to discover in what direction we are drifting, is posi- 
tive, absolute, and indispensable. 



7 Lives and Times of the Roman Pontiffs. By De Montor. Vol. 
II, pp. 461 to 470. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

THE CHURCH AND LITERATURE. - 

It is of the highest importance that the papal interpreta- 
tion of the decree of infallibility should be understood. This 
can be ascertained only by obtaining information from au- 
thoritative sources, from those who bear such relations to 
the pope as entitle what they say of the intentions and pur- 
poses of those charged with the administration of Church 
affairs, not merely at Rome but elsewhere throughout the 
world, to the highest consideration. In the absence of any 
direct avowal sent forth from the Vatican, the next best 
evidence is embodied in the papal literature, manifestly pro- 
vided to explain the character of such teachings as it is de- 
signed to introduce into Roman Catholic religious schools in the 
United States, and into our common schools, provided Mgr. 
Satolli should make his mission here a success. The consci- 
entious " searcher after truth" — whether Protestant or Roman 
Catholic — will find himself well rewarded for whatsoever 
labor he may expend in this method of investigation. If he 
be a Protestant, he will see that all the principles of Prot- 
estantism, religious and civil, are threatened; and if he be a 
Roman Catholic, not belonging to the ecclesiastic body, he 
will be likely to discover that his silence is construed by his 
Church authorities into acquiescence in politico-religious 
opinions which his conscience repudiates and condemns. 

During the progress of the Italian revolution in 1868, 
a work appeared in Italy from the pen of P. Franco, wherein 
the relations between the Church and secular Governments, 
as well as individuals and communities, were elaborately dis- 
cussed. This work was evidently authoritative, and if it did 
not have the special approval of Pius IX, it undoubtedly had 

443 



444 FOOTPBINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

that of those high in position at the Vatican. It had two 
controlling objects : First, to check the revolution, and to 
bring the Italian people into a proper state of obedience to 
the pope, as a temporal monarch with absolute authority ; 
second, to prepare the way for the acknowledgment of the 
infallibility of the pope, which was then in contemplation. 
It failed in the first, because that involved the .civil and 
political rights of the Italian people, which they had deter- 
mined not to leave longer under the dominion of irrespon- 
sible monarchical power ; and aided, it is supposed, in ac- 
complishing the second, because it was asserted and believed 
that it had reference only to matters of religious faith. At 
all events, the passage of the decree encountered no direct 
resistance from the Italian people, as it would undoubtedly 
have done if they had supposed it intended to counteract 
and destroy the influences of the revolution, in so far as they 
affected their political rights. 

After the decree was passed, it was considered important 
that this work of Franco should be translated into the Eng- 
lish language, so as to bring all English-speaking Roman 
Catholics to the point of accepting papal infallibility, both 
as an accomplished fact and the only true religious faith ; 
and to convince them of the enormous sin they would com- 
mit by refusing to do so. Lord Robert Montagu, a Roman 
Catholic member of the British Parliament, became the trans- 
lator, following the original, as far as he considered it expedi- 
ent, upon points of religious doctrine, and adding some re- 
flections of his own. It was published in London in 1874 — 
four years after the passage of the decree — in order to create 
English opinion in favor of the restoration of the temporal 
power of the pope, and the recognition of his infallibility. 
This work has 428 pages, almost every one of which 
contains assertions designed to prove that the spirit of the 
present progressive age is offensive to God, and that man- 
kind can be saved from eternal perdition in no other way 
than by conceding to the pope the universality of dominion 
which it claims for him, and which, if granted, would over- 



THE CHURCH AND LITERATURE. 445 

turn every Government existing in the world, and, first of 
all, the present Government of Italy. It is almost impossible, 
within a reasonable compass, to explain anything more than 
his general ideas, and such of these only as are intended to 
show how the powers and authority of the Church and the 
pope — made equivalent terms by the decree — are viewed by 
those whose position and character entitle them to speak 
knowingly and authoritatively. For the want of such infor- 
mation as this volume, and others of the same kind, contain, 
multitudes of good-intentioned people, both Protestants and 
Roman Catholics, are misled. 

He attributes the present "spread of false principles," 
now prevailing in the progressive nations, to two causes: 
First, "modern civilization;" and second, "freedom of con- 
science," or "the right of private judgment." He considers 
all who "respect every religion" as guilty of "formal apos- 
tasy;" and says that "Catholics certainly are intolerant, 
and so they ought to be," because "if a Catholic is not in- 
tolerant, he is either a hypocrite, or else does not really be- 
lieve what he professes." 1 He insists that when a contest 
shall arise " between an ecclesiastical and a lay authority, the 
Church knows infallibly that it belongs to her to determine the 
question," not only over "spiritual matters," but " whether 
the point in dispute be a spiritual matter, or necessarily con- 
nected with a spiritual matter." Hence he argues, in expla- 
nation, that "therefore the temporal authority must be sub- 
ordinate to the spiritual ; the civil authority, and its rights and 
powers, must be placed at the absolute disposal of the Church ;" 
that is, the State must obey the pope in whatsoever he shall 
command or exact. Consequently, says he, "the Church, 
whose end is the highest end of man, must be preferred before 
the State; for all States regard only a temporary or earthly 
end. If, then, we have to avoid an imperium in imperio, it is 
necessary that the temporal State should give way to the eternal 



1 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Beligion. By Lord Kob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. Introduction, pp. 1 to 5; text, pp. 42 to 47. 



446 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

Church;" that is, the laws of the Church must be obeyed be- 
fore those of the State. He is careful to designate the duties 
of a secular Government like ours as follows: " Let it look 
to the civil and criminal laws, its army, its trade, its finance, 
its railways, its screw-frigates, and its telegraphs; but let it 
not step out of its province, and, like Oza, put forth its hand 
to hold up the ark of God." To make the Church free, the 
pope must be absolutely independent, and not " in the power 
of any Government — with the control of education, and the 
right to 'administer and dispose of her own property."' Re- 
ferring to a free Government, such as that of the United 
States, he says: " A State which is free from the Church is an 
atheistical State; it denotes a godless Government and godless 
laivs, . . . whicli knoivs nothing of any kind of religion, and 
which, therefore, determines to do without God." In order to 
avoid confusion, the State must be subordinate to and de- 
pendent upon the Church, because, "by separating Oiurch 
and State, you cut man in two, and make inextricable confusion," 
and because also "a separation of Church and State is the 
destruction both of the State and the religion of the people." 
And so he argues that " the State can not be separated from 
the Church without commencing its decadence and ruin;" 
wherefore " the State must obey the legitimate authority of 
the Church, and be in subordination to the Church, so that 
there may be no clashing of authorities, or conflict of juris- 
dictions." 2 

He fiercely denounces secret societies, such as the Freema- 
sons, but strangely omits the Jesuits, whose proceedings have 
always been sheltered behind an impenetrable veil. All such 
as are not favorable to the papal demands he calls the " slaves 
of the devil," and represents them as belonging to " the syna- 
gogue of Satan," only for the reason that they do not bow 
their necks to the pontifical yoke — a method of denunciation 
as persistently indulged in by such writers, as if Christ had 



2 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Religion. By Lord Rob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. Pages 122 to 136. 



THE CHURCH AND LITERATURE. 447 

commanded the passions of hatred and revenge to be culti- 
vated, and not suppressed. Referring to the bulls of Clem- 
ent IX, Benedict XIV, Pius VII, and Leo XII, excom- 
municating all who show favor to or harbor them, he declares 
that any oaths they may take are not binding. He does not 
base this upon the conclusion that they are not authorized by 
law, and are merely voluntary, but upon the third canon of 
the Third Council of Lateran, which applies to all oaths of 
whatsoever character, and provides that "it is not an oath, 
but an act of perjury, when a man swears to do anything against 
the Church ;" as, for example, our oath of naturalization and 
allegiance, which requires fidelity to heretical institutions, 
and the maintenance of the atheistical principle, which re- 
quires the State to be separated from the Church. 3 

The "liberty and independence of the pope in his spirit- 
ual government," he makes to mean "not only the liberty 
and independence of his own person, but also that of the 
numerous great dignitaries of the Church who assist him, 
and of the officials and ministers and employees of every 
order whom he requires, and who are required by the numer- 
ous ecclesiastical institutions which surround him, and which 
extend their operations over the whole world." In this ex- 
traordinary and pretentious claim there is no disguise — not 
even equivocation. All appointed by the pope, including a 
whole army of employees, of every grade, are to be exempt 
from the operations of the public laws of all Protestant Gov- 
ernments and answerable alone to the pope ! Let the friends 
of popular government mark well the reason for this univer- 
sality of the pope's absolute jurisdiction over the world. It 
is this, that "if any Government were to have jurisdiction 
over them, except that of the pope alone, or if any Govern- 
ment were able to impede their action, then the pope would 
have less immunity and freedom of action than an ambas- 
sador of the meanest power in the world," because he could 



3 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Religion. By Lord Rob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. Pages 139-140. 



448 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

not compel them to obey his laws and commands — that is, 
the Canon law — instead of those of the State. And he 
carries this idea of antagonism between the laws of a State 
and the Canon laws, to the extent of the excommunication of 
the former for " sanctioning some antichristian principle;" 
such, for example, as the separation of Church and State, 
secular education, or civil marriages. In any of these cases, 
"that luckless State may find itself confronted by the hvo hundred 
million Catholics in the world, and the God of armies, who pro- 
tect the Church!"* And because these "two hundred million 
Catholics" — which exceeds the actual number by twenty-five 
million — do not protest against such vain threats as this, the 
Church authorities interpret their silence to mean approval, 
and thus they convert their follies of one day into the in- 
fatuation of the next, and finally into positive hallucination. 
This distinguished author furnishes many additional evidences 
of this — evidences sufficient to convince any unbiased mind, 
beyond any ground for reasonable doubt, that the Jesuits 
obtained complete triumph over the pope, and he over the 
Church. 

All independent Governments claim and exercise the right 
to regulate and manage their own affairs, and when this right 
is lost, from whatsoever cause, their independence is brought 
to an end. Yet this author lays it down as a settled prin- 
ciple of ecclesiastical law that the Church — that is, the 
pope — possesses the exclusive authority to decide its own 
jurisdiction over spirituals and temporals. After averring 
that "the Church alone is competent to declare what she is 
and what belongs to her," he affirms the doctrines announced 
by the celebrated Syllabus of Pius IX, and charges those who 
do not accept these teachings with renouncing the only true 
faith. " The pope," says he, " can not sanction indifferentism 
or liberty of worship, nor civil marriages, nor secular educa- 
tion ; he can not concede liberty, or rather license, of the press ; 



4 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Religion. By Lord Rob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. rages 193 to 196. 



THE CHURCH AND LITERATURE. 449 

nor recognize sovereignty of the people) nor admit the necessity 
of the 'social evil;' nor legalize robbery and murder" — thus 
placing some of the essential principles of our Government 
upon a level with the most flagrant crimes. He characterizes 
"the daily paper" as the "common sewer of human in- 
iquities," and considers popular government such an abomi- 
nation that the Church must not be silent wheresoever "a 
false principle — the sovereignty of the people" — shall prevail. 
Hence, in order to correct these evils and extirpate these 
heresies, the "priests must enter into politics," because the 
Church "has a right and duty to meddle in every question, 
in so far as it is in the moral order" — giving, by way of illus- 
tration, "trade, commerce, finance, and military and naval 
matters." If a State shall do anything to hinder the accom- 
plishment of any of the supernatural ends sought after by 
the Church, it must be reduced to subordination, as "it is 
the duty of the superior society to correct it." Hence "re- 
ligion must of necessity enter into politics, if government is not 
to become an impossibility." And, surveying the whole field 
occupied by the modern nations, he admonishes society to 
avoid a republic, and adds: "Let the form of government 
be a republic, and you will then endure the horrors of the 
democracy of '89, or of the Commune of '71 ; for a nation 
will assuredly plunge itself into misery as soon as it attempts 
to govern itself" 5 

He devotes a chapter to liberty, in which he says "liberty 
of thought is, in fact, the principle of disorder and uncer- 
tainty, and a license to commit every crime." He condemns 
"liberty of speech," "liberty of the press," "freedom of 
worship, religious liberty, or equality of Churches," and de- 
clares that "freedom of worship, or religious liberty, is a 
false and pernicious liberty." 6 But being compelled to realize 
that Roman Catholics are allowed freedom of religious belief 
and worship in Protestant countries, he finds himself con- 



5 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Religion. By Lord Rob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. Pages 201 to 238. 6 Ibid., pp. 311 to 316. 

29 



450 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

strained to make an explanation. In doing so, however, he 
makes a startling exhibition of Romish and Jesuit intoler- 
ance, wheresoever the power to enforce it is possessed. What 
is to follow from his pen should command the most serious 
attention from all American readers, whatsoever their relig- 
ion. His book was not written and published under influ- 
ences favorable to the liberty of the press, but under papal 
auspices exclusively. It is fairly to be presumed that he was 
chosen by the proper papal authority for the purpose, and 
that so far from its having been placed upon the "Prohibi- 
tory Index" it has the highest papal sanction. He says: 

"Thus it is that Catholics, in some countries, ask for 
liberty of education, liberty of worship, liberty of* speech, 
liberty of the press, and so forth; not because these are good 
things, but because, in those countries, the compulsory educa- 
tion, the law for conformity of worship, the press law, etc., 
enforce that which is far ivorse. In the Egyptian darkness of 
error, it is good to obtain a little struggling ray of light. It 
is better to be on a Cunard steamer than on a raft, but if 
the steamer was going down the raft would be preferable. 
So it is relatively good, in a pagan or heretic country, to obtain 
liberty of worship, or religious liberty ; but that choice no more 
proves that it is absolutely good, and should be granted in 
Catholic countries also, than your getting on a. raft in mid- 
ocean proves that every one, in all cases, should do so. Still 
less does it follow that, because liberty of worship is demanded in 
Protestant countries, therefore it should be granted in Catholic 
countries. To deny religious liberty would be contradictory of 
the principle of Protestantism, which is the right of private 
judgment. Bid the principle of Catholicism is repugnant to a 
liberty of worship; for the principle of Catholicism is that God 
has appointed an infallible Teacher of faith and morals." 7 

He proceeds, with marvelous complacency, to argue that 
Protestants have no right to be intolerant toward Roman 



7 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Religion. By Lord Rob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. Page 318. 



THE CHURCH AND LITERATURE. 451 

Catholics, because " they have no business to imagine that 
truth is on their side," and "lies and errors have no rights;" 8 
but Koman Catholics have a right to be intolerant towards 
Protestants because truth abides only with them. 

The liberty of the press is especially denounced. It is 
called " the most hurtful of liberties," and restraints and 
" checks should be imposed upon the press." It is con- 
demned as " a crime," and, it is said, " there is no right to 
a freedom of the press." In order to prove how hard the 
popes and Councils have struggled to put a stop to "telling 
lies in public" by " newspaper editors," he cites the "strict 
orders" issued by the Lateran Council, under Leo X, that 
nothing should be published which the bishops did not ap- 
prove; and the renewal of these orders by the Council of 
Trent. He then enumerates the following popes, who pre- 
scribed rules and injunctions to prevent these commands from 
being evaded : Alexander VII, Clement VIII, Benedict XIV, 
Pius VI, Pius VII, Leo XII, Pius VIII, Gregory XVI, the 
last of whom is represented as saying that "the freedom of 
the press is ' detestable ' and ' execrable ;' " and lastly, Pius 
IX, in the seventy-ninth proposition of his Syllabus. 9 

He expresses the most sovereign contempt for the people 
and to the principle of fraternity which unites them in a 
mutual bond fpr the establishment and maintenance of 
their own civil and religious liberty. "As dogs have their 
bark," says he, "and ' brindle cats ' their mews, as horses 
have their neighs and donkeys their brays, so have the popu- 
lace their cries." He continues : " Dirty democrats overthrow 
those who are above them, in order to leap into their seats 
and oppose all other dirty democrats." 10 He condemns the 
idea of the sovereignty of the people, as it is established in 
the United States, in the severest terms. Where this maxim 
prevails, according to him, "no government would be pos- 
sible," because everything would be in "fearful disorder," 

8 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Eeligion. By Lord Bob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. Page 319. » Ibid., pp. 328-333. 
™Ibid., pp. 338-339. 



452 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

for the reason that " men have always lived in submission," 
and every society should continue to have " a permanent au- 
thority over" it. And as this authority must have its der- 
ivation from God, the pope must be this permanent ruler, 
because he alone represents God. He draws a picture of 
the people performing the "juggling trick and acrobat feat 
of functioning the office of sovereign." He mocks at the 
"supreme wisdom in the legislation of tinkers;" the "far- 
sighted prudence in the commands of clodpoles, hucksters, 
and scavengers;" and the " docility and readiness to obey in 
their beer-wrought, undisciplined minds." Classing all peo- 
ples who have established Governments subject to their own 
will, as included in the false picture he has drawn, he avers 
" that the people possess no authority, and as they have it 
not, they can not delegate it." "The sovereignty of the 
people, on the contrary, is the origin of every sort of evil, 
and the destruction of the public good or 'commonweal.'" 
" The people can not ever understand the principles of jus- 
tice ; they have lost, behind their counters, the little sense 
of right they had." 11 

In the chapter from which these extracts are taken, there 
are a couple of sentences intentionally passed by as worthy 
of special notice and comment. They are pregnant with 
meaning, and especially interesting to us in this country, in 
view of the fact that Protestants are regarded as rebels 
against the Church, and are, as a class, still held to be within 
its jurisdiction, aud subject, like sheep that have strayed 
away, to be brought back into the fold again. These ques- 
tions are asked : 

"If you refuse to recognize the authority of Christ in 
the Church, how can you expect your subjects to recognize 
your authority in the State? If it is lawful for you to revolt 
from the Church, it must be lawful for others to rebel against 
the State ?" n 



11 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Religion. By Lord Rob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. Pages 361-365. * 2 Ibid., pp. 356-357. 



THE CHURCH AND LITERATURE. 453 

"Whilst this does not openly assert the right of Eoman 
Catholics to revolt against Protestantism and Protestant in- 
stitutions, it not only suggests, but leaves it to be inferred. 
Everybody knows that Protestantism was the fruit of a re- 
volt against the authority of the Church at Rome. Accord- 
ing to this author, and the teachings of that Church, no just 
rights were thereby acquired, because none can grow out of 
resistance to its authority. Consequently, Protestantism has 
no right to exist, and it is the duty of the Church to reduce 
it to obedience — that is, to destroy it — whensoever it can be 
accomplished. Hence the suggestions of the author include 
two propositions : First, that as Protestantism is rebellion 
against the Church, it has set an example which may be 
rightfully followed in rebellion against itself; and, second, 
that if Protestantism has, by its rebellion against the Church, 
established civil institutions which the Church considers in- 
imical to itself, "it must be lawful" to rebel against such 
institutions until they shall be made to conform to the inter- 
ests and welfare of the Church. Hence, as his theories ad- 
vance, he denies that any such thing as nationality, as under- 
stood by all modern peoples, can have any rightful existence, 
because " it is opposed to the Church's precept of submis- 
sion to lawful authority ; 13 in other words, it is opposed to 
the right of the infallible pope to ignore all the boundary- 
lines of States, and make himself the sovereign and universal 
dispenser of the governiug authority of the world within 
whatsoever jurisdiction he himself shall define. In the same 
connection he condemns the doctrine of non-intervention 
among nations, and insists that it is their duty to interfere 
with the affairs of each other, for the reason that "Christian 
charity commands men and nations to come to the rescue of 
each other." 14 "Mutual help," says he, " is a fundamental 
duty of Christianity ; and therefore non-intervention must 
be a principle belonging to paganism." 15 This doctrine is 



13 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Religion. By Lord Rob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. Page 375. " Ibid., p. 381. » Ibid., p. 382. 



454 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

manifestly employed to convince all Roman Catholics through- 
out the world that it is their duty to bring, not only them- 
selves, but the Governments under which they live, to the 
point of interfering with the affairs of Italy, by force, if 
necessary, in order to secure the restoration of the pope's 
temporal power. In so far as it applies to the United States 
it advises that our non-intervention laws shall be disregarded, 
because, in enacting them, the Government usurped a power 
which did not belong to it, inasmuch as it tends to results 
prejudicial to the sovereign rights of the pope. In further- 
ance of the same idea, he strenuously resists the doctrine of 
what is known as accomplislied facts — what the French call 
fait accompli; that is, the recognition of the independence 
and nationality of a Government which has been successful 
in maintaining itself, as the kingdom of Italy has done, 
by revolutionary resistance to the arbitrary temporal power 
of the pope. Therefore, as the present Government of Italy 
is an " oppressive tyranny," has acquired no rights, but has 
shown " only crime upon crime in a never-ending chain of 
iniquities," the " old order of things," with the pope as a 
temporal monarch, possessed of absolute power to dictate all 
the laws, should be returned to. 16 

We must follow this author somewhat farther, because, 
before closing, he reaches a point absolutely vital under civil 
institutions like those of this country. He devotes over a 
dozen pages to " liberal Catholics" in order to prove that, as 
the Church must necessarily be intolerant, liberalism is one 
of the forms of heresy. u To be Catholic with the pope, 
and to be liberal with the Government, are contradictory 
characters; they can not exist in the same subject;" 17 be- 
cause the former involves that which is true, and the latter 
that which is false, where the civil constitution does not con- 
form to the papal ideas. Such "liberal Catholics" as "put 
their faith in liberty of ilie press, representative government, min- 



16 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Keligion. By Lord Rob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. Page 387. 17 Ibid., p. 395. 



THE CHURCH AND LITERATURE. 455 

isterial responsibility, or the like" — as all foreign-born Roman 
Catholics who have taken the oath of allegiance to the 
United States have sworn to do — "betray not only an igno- 
rance or oblivion of what is vital to religion, and of the principles 
which Christianity requires in Governments and constitutions ; but 
also a most false and pernicious opinion." And in expressing 
his amazement that there are any in the Church so liberal 
towards a Government that is entirely secular and not sub- 
ject to the dictation of the pope, he asks this question: "Is 
it not a matter of marvel that any one should imagine him- 
self to be a Catholic, while he is liberal with the Government?" 
He recognizes no authority for the government of society but 
that of the Church, because conformity to the law of God 
can be obtained in no other way; and therefore he says: 
"If this idea of authority is contradicted, counterbalanced, 
or checked in the constitution of a country, then the Govern- 
ment is founded on a basis which is opposed to reason, to nature, 
and to the Christian faith." And for this reason, " modern 
constitutions have therefore put themselves into direct antagonism 
to the Catholic religion." 18 Consequently, he continues, "every 
honest man, in every country, now sighs out a new prayer 
to his litany: "From a Legislative Chamber, ' good Lord, de- 
liver us !' " 19 He insists that fidelity to the Church consists in 
the observance of all the dogmas set forth in the Syllabus of 
Pius IX, and thus enumerates these important propositions 
contained in it: The 55th condemning the separation of 
Church and State ; the limitation of the rights of Govern- 
ments declared by the 67th ; the liberty of worship con- 
demned by the 77th; the freedom of the press censured by 
the 79th; civil marriage reprobated by the 65th to the 
74th; secular education, which is called usurpation, pro- 
scribed by the 45th to the 48th ; oppression of the clergy 
denounced in the 49th; and "all the principles of liberalism, 
of progress, and of modern civilization," declared in the 



18 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Religion. By Lord Rob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. Pages 396 to 398. 19 Ibid., pp. 400-401. 



456 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 



80th, "to be irreconcilable with the Catholicism of the 
pope." 20 

With a few more brief comments upon "civil marriage," 
the " secularization of education," and the Jesuits, this extraor- 
dinary book is brought to a close by admonishing the faith- 
ful not to permit their children to receive "a godless educa- 
tion" in such public schools as are authorized by the laws of 
all our States — because all education should be under the 
supervision of the Church — and by announcing in serious and 
solemn phrase, that "Protestantism lias filled the world with 
ruins I" 21 

What an extent of infatuation must have incited this last 
remark ! There need be said of it only that, in former times, 
there were powerful Governments subject to the dominion of 
the popes, but all these have passed away — not a single one 
is left. Protestant Governments have risen out of the ruins 
of some, and are now rising out of those of others of them, 
and all these are happy, prosperous, and progressive; whilst 
the pope himself, with the vast multitude of his allies assist- 
ing him, is devoting all the power given him by the Church 
to persuade them to retrace their steps and return to the 
retrogressive period of the Middle Ages. The author of the 
work to which so much space has been appropriated, is one 
of his conspicuous allies, far from being the least distin- 
guished among them ; and for that reason the doctrines he has 
announced in behalf of the papacy have been set forth at 
unusual length. This having been done, in order that what 
he has said may be thoroughly comprehended, it needs only to 
be further remarked here, that, according to what he has laid 
down as the established religious teachings of the Roman 
Church, with an infallible pope at its head, it is impossible 
for any man to maintain those teachings and at the same 
time be loyal to the Government of the United States. There 
is no escape from this; but before further comments upon 



20 Popular Errors Concerning Politics and Religion. By Lord Rob- 
ert Montagu, M. P. Page 406. 21 Ibid., p. 427. 



THE CHURCH AND LITERATURE. 457 

this point, there are other evidences to show how, since the 
pope's infallibility was decreed, the lines of distinction be- 
tween the popular and papal forms of government have been 
so distinctly announced that it requires very little sagacity 
to distinguish them, and even less to realize that they can 
not co-exist in the same country. 

A reverend educator attached to St. Joseph's Seminary, 
Leeds, in England, has, since the Vatican Council, also 
entered upon the task of instructing the English-speaking 
world what are the only relations between civil Governments 
and the Church which an infallible pope can approve. His 
views were first communicated through the columns of the 
Catholic Progress, a periodical of extensive circulation ; but 
they were deemed to be of so much importance and such an es- 
sential part of the permanent literature of the Church, that in 
J 883 they were published in book form so as to assure more 
general reading. This book, entitled "The Catholic Church 
and Civil Governments," contains but little over one hundred 
pages, and, being in cheap form, has found its way to the 
United States, where it is expected, of course, that its teach- 
ings will inoculate the minds of all the faithful, and furnish 
instructors to conduct education in religious schools. What 
it is expected to accomplish will be seen from the following 
references to its contents. 

At the opening of the volume the reader is apprised be- 
forehand of what he shall expect in the way of doctrinal 
teaching. It is dedicated to the present pope, Leo XIII, 
who, besides being designated as the vicar of Christ, is ad- 
dressed as "The Christ on earth!" — not as man, with the 
faculties and frailties of human nature, but as God himself! 
Although the author is not represented as a Jesuit, it may 
well be inferred that he is one, from these blasphemous words, 
which shock the sense of Christian propriety, and ought to 
excite indignation in every intelligent Christian mind. 

He starts out by assuming that the present pope "is still 
a king," and that "he exercises a real authority over his 
subjects, irrespective of the country to which by birth they 



458 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

belong." 2 ' 2 In this he agrees with the Italian P. Franco, and 
the English statesman Lord Montagu, that the principle of 
nationality can not be permitted to prevail against the pope 
in his march to universal dominion — that State lines and even 
ocean boundaries amount to nothing. Upon this hypothesis 
he bases the assumption that the Church "is a public society, 
a kingdom, a divine State," and possesses "the power of 
public jurisprudence." 23 Elsewhere he calls this "external 
power to legislate ;" that is, to pass laws binding the con- 
sciences of her subjects, to take means to insure those laws 
being put in exercise, to be herself the judge of the sense of 
her laws, to punish them that trespass against the laws, and 
to bring them into the right path by coercion." 2 ' He en- 
deavors, by various modes of statement, to establish the 
proposition that the Church is " independent" of all civil 
Governments, until he reaches the point of positively asserting 
it; * assigning as the reason that the "Church is the contin- 
uation of the authoritative presence of Jesus Christ in the 
world." 26 Turning away, only for a moment, from the idea 
of a "universal Christendom" — unlimited by the separate 
nationality of States — he draws a melancholy picture of the 
condition of the world, unless this independence of the Church 
shall be fully recognized. "Once grant," says he, "that 
the Church is subordinate to the civil State, and there will 
ensue a complete upsetting of the scheme of salvation, an 
entire submersion of divine truth, a total overthrow — nay, an 
utter destruction — of the kingdom of Christ." w " She knows 
that no earthly power can bind her," nor can she "swear 
fealty, or own allegiance to any other sovereign," which 
propositions he proves by the Syllabus of Pius IX. 28 Hence, 
he repeats, "The Church is a perfect society, and independ- 
ent of the State;" 29 and emphasizes it by declaring " that the 
State is in the Church, as a college is in the State." 30 She has 



22 The Catholic Church and Civil Governments. By Rev. John 
Earnshaw. Preface, p. vi. *» Ibid., pp. 18-19. u Ibid , p. 26. 

« Ibid., p. 31. 26 Ibid., p. 33. « Ibid., p. 34. w Ibid., p. 44. 

»i&id.,p 45. ™ Ibid., p. 46. 



THE CHURCH AND LITERATURE. 459 

" the right of way. She has the right to enter every king- 
dom in the world, to set up her tents, to propagate her doc- 
trine, to make subjects, ... to reign in every corner 
of the earth," 31 and "to use the weapons most suited to accom- 
plish her object" 32 She "is bound to use the means most con- 
ducive to her spiritual end," and "the illuminating spirit" 
that guides her "shows her the advantage of sometimes 
making use of temporal means." Besides fasting, abstinence, 
excommunication, and interdicts, " even more severe meas- 
ures have occasionally been found to be very salutary." She 
"is justified in using extrinsic coercion whenever it promises 
to be a help," according to " the principle of the coercive 
power," asserted by Pius IX in the twenty-fourth proposi- 
tion of the Syllabus. Primarily these coercive measures are 
to be employed against " only the members of the Church;" 
but are subject to be employed at the discretion of the pope 
against all baptized persons. " Once baptized," says he, 
" then the Church has over them all the rights of a parent." 33 
This includes baptized Protestants, who, by the decree of the 
Council of Trent, are considered as sheep gone astray, but 
still within the jurisdiction of the Church. 

The Church, he insists, is subordinate to the State in 
nothing, but the State is "subordinate to and under the 
guidance of the Church in all matters which touch, even in- 
cidentally, upon the moral life of the State." 34 The State 
" is bound not to institute any law or sanction any custom 
which can in any way hinder the Church in gaining her 
supernatural end," and "is bound to aid the Church by a 
material assistance whenever she deems such assistance neces- 
sary." 35 "At the present day there does not remain one 
truly Catholic State." 36 But this does not release them from 
the obligation of obedience to the Church, because the "greater 
portion of their subjects are baptized," and " baptism enrolls 
a man among the children of the Church ; and hence, in 

31 The Catholic Church and Civil Governments. By Rev. John 
Eamshaw. Pages 48, 49. 32 Ibid., p. 51. 33 Ibid., pp. 52-53. 

3 * Ibid., p. 64. 35 Ibid., p. 67. 36 Ibid., p. 68. 



460 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

spite of their denying the claims of their true spiritual Mas- 
ter, they are, as Christian States, still bound by one obliga- 
tion ; namely, to refrain from establishing any law which is 
against the conscience of their Catholic subjects." 37 There- 
fore the Church must "be obeyed by her subjects, with or 
without the good-will of the civil poiver." 38 " The Church has 
a right to carry out her divine mission in every land, and 
to do so, if need be, in spite of the civil power."™ "The 
Church sends her ministers throughout the world," " inde- 
pendently of the favor or permission of the temporal powers," 
and invests them with "absolute power." 40 When the pope 
assigns them a duty, "he gives them a right to carry out 
that duty in the teeth of every earthly power." iX "For the 
civil power to endeavor to hinder the Church in the exercise 
of this right is a crime. It is to resist God." 42 He claims 
for the Church the right to go into all the countries in the 
world, with or without their consent, and " there to establish 
and unfold herself, to set up her machinery " in whatsoever 
way she may deem expedient. 43 "Hence," says he, "the 
Church has a right to erect her hierarchy, to set up her tri- 
bunals, to hold her synods, to open schools, to found colleges 
and convents, and especially to be free and unfettered in her 
communications with the pope. She has a right to spread 
the faith, and needs not to sue for leave from any earthly power." u 
"And this right the Church can never lose. It can never 
become obsolete. No length of time can prescribe against 
it;" 45 that is, no Government can exist long enough to ac- 
quire the right to mature a system of laws which the pope 
may not rightfully command to be resisted and set aside, 
when he shall decide that the interests of the Church require 
it to be done. 

Before closing, he treats of the separation of Ckurch and 
State, and justifies the condemnation of it by Pius IX in the 



37 The Catholic Church and Civil Governments. By Rev. John 

Eamshaw. Pages 69-70. 38 Ibid., p. 71. 39 Ibid., p. 7(>. 

4 ° Ibid., p. 77. « Ibid., p. 78. « Ibid., p. 79. « Ibid., p. 82. 
"Ibid., -p. 83. «JWd.,p. 84. 



THE CHURCH AND LITERATURE. 461 

Syllabus, and says that "after such a declaration of the 
supreme pastor, no true Catholic can hold that 'politics and re- 
ligion ought to be utterly separate" But not content with the 
authority of Pius IX upon this point, he adds that of the 
present pope, Leo XIII, whom he represents as having lifted 
up his voice " to teach the world that, while the Church and 
the civil Governments are orders distinct in their origin and 
in their nature, it is the will of heaven that religion lend its 
aid to the State, and that the State should support religion;"* 6 
that is, the Church and the State should be united together, 
and each aid the other in maintaining its authority, so that, 
by their joint alliance, they should be able to render a Govern- 
ment of and by the people impossible. In order to accom- 
plish this and the other objects pointed out by him, he repre- 
sents that the Church " brooks many affronts, and suffers 
mauy wrongs, and makes herself all things to all men" — as 
the Jesuits did when they worshiped idols in China, and be- 
came Brahmins in India — so that she may bring all nations 
and peoples under her dominion, and the pope become the 
ruling power of the world, " independent of all civil Govern- 
ments," and "subject to no earthly ruler." 

Thus we have, in plain and authoritative language, a 
complete portrayal of the only form of government which 
the pope can approve. If he seems to be reconciled for the 
time being to any other form, it is merely because it is ex- 
pedient to do so, so that by being " all things to all men," 
in obedience to Jesuit teaching, he may thereby make him- 
self surer of ultimate triumph. Every man who shall take 
the pains to scan the foregoing evidence will find in it 
ample proof of the fact — to say nothing about other independ- 
ent Governments — that the papal system is more antago- 
nistical to the civil institutions of the United States than to 
any other in the world. Whatsoever professions to the con- 
trary may be put forth, it is a palpable truth, absolutely 



46 The Catholic Church and Civil Governments. By Eev. John 
Earnshaw. Page 99. 



462 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

incontestable, that the fundamental principles of our Govern- 
ment are the subjects of constant and vindictive assault by 
the papal party — the followers of the pope — in and out of 
the United States. The framers of our Government secular- 
ized it by measures which resulted in separating Church and 
State, but the pope and his hierarchy, aided by the Jesuits, 
fling in our faces the accusation that, in doing so, they vio- 
lated the divine law which it is their religious duty to restore. 
We have established a nationality of our own, recognized by 
all the nations of the earth, but they tell us that it possesses 
no authority to impose the least restriction, by any laws it 
can enact, upon the power of the pope or his army of min- 
isters and employees within the borders of our own territory. 
We have guaranteed freedom of conscience, or diversity of 
religious belief, but they confront us with the charge of 
heresy on account of it, and openly avow their purpose to 
destroy this guarantee by employing the combined powers of 
Church and State to unify their own religion, to the ex- 
clusion of all others, by laws above and superior to our Consti- 
tution. We have secured freedom of speech and of the press, 
and have provided for civil marriages, and for the secular 
education of our children at the public expense; and they 
tell us that, on account of these and other equally important 
measures of public policy, we have become a ''godless" na- 
tion, living under ''godless" laws enacted for "godless" pur- 
poses, and that they have been divinely appointed to perform 
the holy duty of exterminating all these evils, in order to 
save us from the destruction inevitably awaiting us on ac- 
count of them. One is required to give but a single moment 
to reflection to be assured that if the pope, by the aid of his 
hierarchy and the Jesuits, shall be permitted to achieve the 
results for which they are now so anxiously seeking, and ac- 
quire such dominion as they desire in the United States, our 
free institutions must come to an end. They can win suc- 
cess only by our defeat. Papal government can only prevail 
here when our present civil institutions shall be destroyed. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

INTRIGUES AND INTERPRETATIONS. 

One of the most conspicuous manifestations of the spirit 
now prevailing among the leading nations, is that all of them 
are struggling to go forward and not backward. Italy, in 
this respect, does not constitute an exception to this general 
rule, as her present prominent position in Europe abundantly 
testifies. Hence, every sensible man well knows that the 
Government now existing there can not be overthrown, so 
that the temporal power of the pope can be restored, except 
by another revolution or. by the military invasion of a for- 
eign power. Which of these remedies it is the purpose of 
the papacy to invoke can only be conjectured. But since 
one or the other of them must, from necessity, be in contem- 
plation, it is essentially important that the true relation 
which the dogma of papal infallibility bears to the temporal 
power should be well understood, in order to see — what will 
be apparent to any careful investigator — the impress of the 
Jesuits upon the papal policy, and that, but for them, the 
Church would be left to the enjoyment of its religious faith, 
without disturbance by any of the nations. 

The temporal power was always an enemy to the peace 
of the Church — rending it into hostile factions — separating 
the Eastern from the Western Christians, and introducing 
feuds and strifes and schisms between popes and anti-popes, 
cardinals and clergy, and those who followed them in their 
long and angry conflicts. Before this tremendous power was 
usurped, and papal ambition was incited by the desire to 
possess it, the Church of Rome embraced within its fold al- 
most the entire Christian world. Now, however, it finds 
itself representing only a minority of those who profess Chris- 

463 



464 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

tianity. 1 All this, and more than this, has been accom- 
plished by restless and ambitious popes, who, defying the ex- 
ample and all the admonitions, not only of Christ himself, 
but of all the primitive Christians, entangled the Church in 
vicious alliances with potentates and kings, in order that 
they might wear crowns of temporal royalty themselves, and 
give increased strength and vigor to the principles of mon- 
archical government by keeping the multitude in super- 
stition, ignorance, and inferiority. And when, in the present 
enlightened age, there is no excuse for not knowing the 
wars, the bloodshed, the persecutions, and the misery, which 
followed this unholy alliance between Church and State, in 
order to create and preserve the temporal power of these 
usurping popes, he must have but little regard for the wel- 
fare of the human race who would again afflict any part of 
the civilized world with these or kindred calamities. The 
Roman Catholic people of Italy have, of their own accord, 
removed them, and those who are now seeking to reafflict 
them by alliances with foreign and alien powers, make them- 
selves disturbers of the world's peace, by seeking to embroil 
other peoples and nations in dangerous combinations for such 
a purpose. 

It is not easy to overestimate the importance and serious- 
ness of the issue involved in the proposition- to restore the 
temporal power of the pope — whether in its relations to 
Roman Catholic or Protestant populations. In so far as the 
former are concerned, it involves the conversion of their re- 
ligious faith into the illiberality and selfishness of- Jesuitism ; 
the sacrifice of the ancient faith of the Church to the prin- 
ciples of a society which boasts that it has plucked out of 



1 In Bartholomew's late "Atlas of the World," the professing 
Christians are thus given : 

Roman Catholics 175,000,000 

Protestants 110,000,000 

Greek Church 90,000,000 

Other Christian sects 20,000,000 

Total Christians, 395,000,000 



INTRIG UES AND INTEBPBETA TIONS. 465 

the hearts of its members every vestige of human sympathy 
and affection, and has spent the whole period of its existence 
in sowing seeds of strife and contention, and in so opposing 
the acknowledged authority of the Church when employed 
to curb their worldly ambition, that one of the best and most 
enlightened of the popes was constrained, by a sense of duty 
to the Church and to the Christian world, not merely to sup- 
press them, but to declare, infallibly and ex cathedra, that the 
suppression was forever. To Protestants it presents but two 
alternatives, either to cast away all the rich fruits of the 
Keformation, or to rebuke the attempt to encroach upon the 
rights the people have acquired after centuries of conflict 
with monarchical and arbitrary power. Both these propo- 
sitions command the most serious and thoughtful considera- 
tion, especially by citizens of the United States, where the 
form of government is designed to conserve all religions, and 
enable those who profess them — no matter how variant and 
conflicting they may be — to live in amicable and peaceful 
relations with each other. No intelligent miud can reflect 
upon the indisputable proofs of history and the philosophy 
they teach, without realizing that, with regard to this issue 
our own course is plain, clear, and unmistakable. 

The ambitious popes — such as Gregory VII, Innocent III, 
and Boniface VIII, as well as others before and after them — 
acquired and maintained their temporal power by a long 
series of coercive and oppressive measures. In order to give 
these measures a religious sanction, they usurped the func- 
tions which pertained to the claim of infallibility, not only 
without the consent of the Church, but in face of the posi- 
tive rejection of that dogma by several Councils, and against 
the almost unanimous sentiment of the multitude of Chris- 
tians. The general polity of the European nations, under 
the dominion of monarchical power as it was united in 
Church and State, was favorable to them, as it kept the peo- 
ple in ignorance *of their natural rights, and too feeble to 
assert them by revolution, if they had resorted to that rem- 
edy. Thus held in subjection, their non-resistance was held 



466 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

to be acquiescence in their own humility. Taking advan- 
tage of this, popes and other kings, as the allies of each 
other, asserted their divine right to govern according only to 
their own united will, and endeavored to establish the infal- 
libility of the pope as a dogma of religious faith, in order to 
retain and increase their monarchical power. Thoughtful 
and intelligent Roman Catholics denied and repudiated this 
doctrine, but were powerless to relieve the multitude from 
the severity of this joint rule, because the entire coercive^ 
power was in the hands of those whose ambition was pro- 
moted by it, and who kept themselves in constant readiness 
to employ it whensoever their interests, both spiritual and 
temporal, were placed in jeopardy. If history does not 
prove all this, it proves nothing. 

When the Reformation period began, and the popes and 
the clergy refused the necessary reforms in the Church, those 
who supported that great movement detached themselves, in 
large numbers, from the papal party, but continued to assert 
their unfaltering fidelity to the primitive Christian faith. 
The reigning authorities were thus confronted with a disin- 
tegrating Church, occasioned by their own refusal to reform 
acknowledged abuses — some of which were so flagrant as to 
furnish a reason to the Jesuits for the recognition of their 
society. It was not an easy matter to arrest this disintegra- 
tion after the treatment of Luther by Leo X, and the diffi- 
culties were increased by the circumstances connected with 
the Council of Trent, as well as by the proceedings of that 
body. There are many evidences of this. Prominent among 
these is the fact that the popes were opposed to a General 
Council, mainly because of the fear that it would refuse to 
affirm their assumption of infallibility, which would neces- 
sarily tend to weaken their hold upon temporal power. But 
for the Emperor Charles V, it is not probable that a Coun- 
cil would have been then held. He repeatedly urged upon 
the pope the necessity of convening one,, but without suc- 
cess. He was coquetting with the Lutheran Protestants in 
Germany by means of his celebrated "interim" and other- 



INTRIG UES AND INTERPRETA TIONS. 467 

wise, in order to strengthen his armies by accessions from 
them. But, at the same time, he cherished the hope that a 
Council would contrive some method of inducing his Lu- 
theran subjects to reunite with the Church, from which they 
had been driven by the usurpations of the papacy and the 
acknowledged vices of the clergy. His main purpose, how- 
ever, was to make the union between the Church and the 
State so indissoluble as to maintain and perpetuate the mon- 
archical principle as protection to both. Finding the popes 
unyielding in their opposition to a General Council, he or- 
dered a national one to be held at Augsburg, in his own do- 
minions, to consider and decide upon such matters concern- 
ing the Church as he deemed expedient. Clement VII was 
then pope, and it required but little reflection to assure him 
that if the emperor succeeded in holding a National Council 
in Germany, it would, with almost positive certainty, re- 
affirm the decisions of the Councils of Constance and Basel, 
rejecting the dogma of infallibility, and thus inflict a dan- 
gerous and probably fatal wound upon the papacy. He was 
completely checkmated by the emperor, and nothing was left 
him but to call a General Council to supersede the National 
Council at Augsburg. It was a game of statecraft between 
rival contestants for the supremacy — neither having been re- 
strained by any higher motives than those which have their 
birth in personal ambition. As for the pope, he preferred 
that the disintegration of the Church should continue rather 
than run the risk of having his infallibility denied by a Gen- 
eral Council, and the possible loss of his temporal power 
which that denial would have threatened. All this is suffi- 
ciently indicated by the impediments thrown in the way of 
the meeting of the Council by the popes. Clement VII 
died four years after making the call, but without fixing the 
time for its assembling. His successor, Paul III, was con- 
strained to fix it for 1537, and to designate Mantua as the 
place. But this did not exhaust all the expedients for de- 
lay. Mantua was objected to for reasons not fully explained, 
and Vincenza was substituted. The time was accordingly 



468 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

postponed one year, until 1538. No meeting having then 
occurred, it was again fixed for 1542. Still, however, in 
order to gain more time, it was transferred to Trent, where 
it did not assemble until December 13, 1545 — thirteen years 
after it was first called by Clement VII. Its last session was 
held December 4, 1563 — eighteen years after it first assem- 
bled, and thirty-one years after it was first called — more 
than a generation of time ! 

During all these years the popes were striving after the 
surest method of perpetuating their claim of infallibility as 
the means of preserving their temporal power. While it is 
to be supposed that they, at the same time, desired to save the 
Church from overthrow, they so blended its cause with their 
own ambitious ends, that the Council, instead of being re- 
formatory, was unable to accomplish anything more than the 
inauguration of a counter revolution to suppress the Refor- 
mation, which, by that time, was becoming more formidable 
everyday. The pope, Julius III, and Charles V had a com- 
mon interest in keeping Church and State united, in order 
to ward off successfully any blows that might be aimed at 
the principle of absolute monarchism. But, apart from this, 
the pope had a separate and distinct interest.of his own, in 
trying to secure, beyond the possibility of loss, the imperial 
rights and prerogatives of the papacy. Embarrassed as he 
was, with the eyes of all Europe centered upon him, he was 
compelled to look for support in every direction, and found 
no contribution to the papal pretensions likely to become 
more valuable than that offered by the Jesuits, who were 
then in readiness, under the lead of Laynez, their general, 
to devote themselves to whatsoever work should be necessary 
to extinguish the spirit of revolt against the monarchism of 
Church and State. 

Remembering the services rendered by Loyola to the 
cause of absolute monarchy, and knowing that the central 
feature of the Jesuit constitution was specially designed for 
the advancement of that cause, the pope resolved to bring 
the united and compact body of Jesuits to his aid, by enlist- 



INTRIO UES AND INTERPRE TA TIONS. 469 

ing them as an army to defend the tottering cause of the 
papacy. The main object of Loyola during his life had 
been to drive back the tide of the Reformation ; and, al- 
though he had signally failed in this, he exhibited such su- 
perior qualities as a general and commander of men, and had 
so succeeded in im parting these same qualities to Laynez, his 
successor, that the pope determined to send the latter as one 
of his legates to the Council, clearly indicating that he was 
both unwilling and afraid to trust the interests of the papacy 
in the hands of those who, by the existing organization of 
the Church, were intrusted with its administrative authority. 
He undoubtedly considered that the most certain, if not the 
only method of preserving the papacy, as distinct from the 
primitive Church, would be the infusion of Jesuit spirit and 
courage into the ranks of its defenders. We have hereto- 
fore seen how Laynez had succeeded at the French Council 
of Poissy in restricting the right of discussion to ecclesiastics 
alone, and it is fair to presume that the knowledge of this 
dictatorial spirit commended him to the pope. At all events, 
he was specially favored and distinguished as the representative 
of the pope and the Jesuits at the same time — a union that 
had but a single signification ; that is, that the pope had ac- 
cepted the Jesuits as his allies in preference to any of the 
existing monastic orders, because, as can not be doubted, 
the latter occupied the field of religious labor, while the 
former considered religious professions and practices as the 
stepping-stone to the acquisition of riches and temporal power. 
Thus favored above any other member of the Council, Lay- 
nez courageously entered into the contest between those who 
defended and those who denied the doctrine of the pope's 
infallibility, and exhibited his great ability in supporting to 
the utmost the extreme claim to spiritual and temporal sov- 
ereignty which such popes as Gregory VII, Innocent III, 
Boniface VIII, and others, now declared to have been infal- 
lible, had for centuries maintained in defiance of the enlight- 
ened sentiment of the whole Christian world. Daring the 
long and tedious sessions of the Council, it had been getting 



470 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

farther and farther away from such conclusions as would 
satisfy those who desired to see the integrity of the Church 
maintained ; and it was not until the time for its closing 
sessions was approaching that Laynez announced the Jesuit 
doctrine with regard to the infallibility of the pope, and the 
authority and power it would confer upon the papacy. Al- 
though, contrary to the expectations of the pope, he did not 
succeed in procuring the affirmance of his doctrines by the 
Council — for if an effort had been made to embody the pope's 
infallibility in the articles of faith, the negative decisions of 
the Councils of Constance and Basel would have been re- 
peated — yet he did succeed in assuring the papacy that its 
most formidable allies were the Jesuits, upon whom it could 
then and always thereafter rely to fight its battles in behalf 
of that dogma, as well as the temporal power, and whatso- 
ever should become necessary to give strength and perma- 
nency to the principle of monarchism in the government of 
both Church and State. This having been accomplished, to- 
gether with as much infusion of Jesuitism into the Creed as 
could then be safely ventured, the pope considered the papacy 
saved, at least for the time being, and dissolved the Council. 
If this Council had been promptly called and convened 
when demanded by Charles V and the numerous body of 
Christians, much that has since transpired to the injury of 
the Church might have been avoided. One result would al- 
most certainly have followed — the reaffirmance of the doc- 
trine of the Councils of Constance and Basel by a denial of 
the pope's infallibility. What a multitude of evils would 
then have been avoided by the Church! With the question 
of infallibility disposed of by adhering to the ancient faith, 
which assigned it to popes and Councils combined as the 
representatives of the universal Church, composed of the whole 
body of Christians, the events then transpiring in Europe 
indicate that the prevailing sentiment in favor of reform 
would have been strong enough to check, if not to arrest, 
the progress of Church disintegration. That accomplished, 
the question of temporal power would have been left as a 



INTRIGUES AND INTERPRETATIONS. 471 

mere domestic one to be settled alone by the Italian people; 
the ambition of the popes would have been no longer tempted 
by the desire to acquire universal sovereignty over the world ; 
their meddling with the temporal affairs of the nations would 
have been rebuked ; harmony and concord might have pre- 
vailed among all Christians, no matter what their differences 
of religious faith ; all controversy about freedom of conscience 
would, in all probability, have ceased ; the people of every 
nation would have been left to manage their own affairs in 
their own way, and there would, doubtless, have been ushered 
in such a period of general prosperity and contentment as it 
has required Protestantism to introduce, in despite the resist- 
ance and anathemas of the papacy, reigned over by disap- 
pointed popes. 

But the doctrine of the pope's infallibility, as announced 
by Laynez in the Council of Trent, deserves to be well scru- 
tinized, in order that its true aud actual meaning may be 
comprehended. He who shall prosecute the laborious re- 
search necessary for this, will not be surprised to find that it 
required over three hundred years of controversy within the 
Church before the papacy was enabled to create a sufficient 
number of obedient and submissive prelates to approve the 
Jesuit teachings of Laynez, as the Vatican Council of 1870 
did by decreeing, not only that the pope then reigning, Pius 
IX, was infallible, but that all the other popes from the be- 
ginning — good, bad, and indifferent — were also infallible ! 
It will, however, excite no little astonishment when he re- 
flects that this was done in the nineteenth century, in the 
face of the popular enlightenment now prevailing, and that 
such a period was selected for this Jesuit and papal triumph 
over the Church — which is neither more nor less than plac- 
ing the future destiny of the Church under Jesuit control, 
with the helm of the ship which bears its most precious treas- 
ures guided by the followers of Loyola and Laynez and the 
Jesuit generals who have succeeded them. 

The language employed by Laynez in this celebrated 
Council — speaking for the pope as his specially empowered 



472 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

legate — is not only expressive, but will be startling to some 
who may now learn it for the first time. It should be well 
scanned and considered by citizens of the United States, 
especially by those Roman Catholics whose silent acquiescence 
in what the papacy has been and is now doing, causes them 
to be regarded as approving what, in their honest consciences, 
vast numbers of them do not approve. On October 20, 
1562 — after the Council had been in existence seventeen years 
without settling the question whether bishops acted under 
Divine appointment or were the mere passive creatures and 
instruments of the popes — Laynez addressed the assemblage 
in a carefully-prepared and elaborate speech, which the his- 
torian says occupied "more than two hours." The occasion 
was a great one for him and the Jesuits — in the nature of a 
turning-point in his and their history. It was the first time 
during the existence of the Church when the voice of a 
Jesuit was heard in a General Council, and the first time when 
the general of that society had been made the special legate 
of the pope. It was also the first time when the Church had 
openly turned its back upon the ancient monastic orders by 
giving preference to a society expressly organized in antag- 
onism to them, for the avowed reason that they were unfitted 
by corruption for rendering efficient service to the Church. 
Laynez was equal to the occasion — his speech liaving been, 
as all agree, a grand display of eminent ability. He pointed 
out the difference between the Church and human Govern- 
ments — the former having been built by Christ, and the latter 
by human societies. Upon this premise he then developed 
the papal and Jesuit theory by saying: "That while Christ 
lived in the mortal flesh, he governed the Church with an 
absolute monarchical government, and being about to depart out 
of this world, he left the same form, appointing for his vicar St. 
Peter and his successors, to administer it as he had done, 
giving him full and total power and jurisdiction, and subjecting 
the Church to him, as it was to himself " This was a bold an- 
nouncement of the infallibility of the popes — of the religious 
dogma that each one of them, in himself alone, possessed the 



INTRIGUES AND INTERPRETATIONS. 473 

"full power and jurisdiction " of an absolute and irresponsible 
monarch. This declaration extorted both praise and cen- 
sure — the latter especially from the Bishop of Paris, who de- 
nounced it as having been invented, within fifty years before, 
in order that its author might gain from the pope a car- 
dinal's cap ; thus showing how well and distinctly it was un- 
derstood that Laynez was the mouthpiece of the pope, and 
was merely echoing his opinions. Notwithstanding this re- 
buke, Laynez was not discomfited — for he well knew the 
potency of the power behind him — but proceeded to establish 
the proposition that Peter, like Christ, was an absolute mon- 
arch, by an argument which has ever since answered the 
same end; that is, because Christ said to him: "Feed [that 
is, govem~\ my sheep [animals, which have no part or judgment 
in governing themselves. J" Then, insisting that Christ intended 
this relation to subsist between the Church and "the Bishop 
of Rome, from St. Peter to the end of the world," he also 
declared that Christ, in addition, "gave him a privilege 
of infallibility in judgment of faith, manners, and religion, bind- 
ing all the Church to hear him, and to stand firmly in that 
which should be determined by him." With the view of ex- 
pressing more distinctly this pre-eminence of the pope over 
the universal Church he continued: "The Church can not 
err, because he can not, and so he that is separated from him 
who is the head of the Church, is separated also from the 
Church;" that is, none can remain within its pale who do 
not accept as infallibly true what the pope shall command 
with reference to faith, manners, and religion. And in order 
to give completeness to the papal and Jesuit system he was 
explaining, he humiliated the bishops by placing them, along 
with the other "animals," at the feet of the pope. He in- 
sisted that as "the apostles ortlained bishops, not by Christ, 
but by St. Peter, receiving jurisdiction from him alone," 
therefore their powers and functions were conferred upon 
them, not by the divine law or will, but by the pope at his 
own will and pleasure — thus making them his creatures, mere 
agents to do his will, ready at all times to yield implicit and 



474 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

uninquiring obedience to his commands, and bound to accept 
the will and law of God as he shall instruct them. 2 

This palpable perversion of the words of Christ, which 
are of plain and simple meaning, has been since so persisted 
in, that multitudes who do not obey his command to "search 
the Scriptures" for themselves have accepted the papal and 
Jesuit interpretation as infallibly true. What he said — "Feed 
my sheep" — can not be tortured into the meaning which that 
interpretation gives to the words. The English word "feed" 
signifies only to supply or furnish with food for nourishment. 
In the Latin Vulgate edition of the New Testament the words 
of Christ are thus expressed: "Pasce oves meas." The word 
"pasce" signifies exactly what the English word feed does; 
so that the translation now accepted by the most enlightened 
portion of the world is precisely accurate. But Laynez, it 
will be seen, so perverted the word pasce, or feed, as to make 
it mean "govern;" whereas, if the authors of the Vulgate 
edition of the New Testament had intended to convey any 
such idea as that, they would have employed either the word 
gubemo, or impero, or dominor, or rego, either of which means 
govern. 3 But he was, manifestly, looking more anxiously after 
the interest of the papacy and the welfare of his society than 
a correct interpretation of Scripture. The principles of the 
Jesuit constitution were deeply imbedded in his mind; and 
inasmuch as he was taught by these that the multitude of 



2 History of the Council of Trent. By Sarpi. London edition. 
1G76. Pages 571-573. 

3 Laynez so far succeeded in influencing the papacy by his method 
of interpreting Scripture, that both the Douay or Eonian Catholic 
Bible and the Kheims Version of the New Testament contain an ex- 
planatory note whereby the papal meaning of the words "Feed my 
sheep " is given as infallibly true. ,It is there said that by these words 
Christ conferred upon Peter " the superintend/ ncij of all his sheep, and 
consequently of his whole flock; that is, of his whole Church." This 
does not go quite to the extent that Laynez did, by converting the 
word feed into govern, but so nearly so as to make a distinction almost 
without a difference. The Latin word "pasce" does not mean either 
to govern or to superintend — nor does the Greek word (36ai(e, but 
simply to feed. If Christ had intended to say to govern or superintend, 



INTRIGUES AND INTERPRETATIONS. 475 

mankind should be reduced to the degrading standard of 
absolute obedience to superiors, his assumption that all the 
members of the Church were "animate" without either the 
right or capacity to govern themselves, and therefore com- 
pletely subject to the mastery of the pope, was a legitimate 
conclusion from his premise. What he evidently designed to 
accomplish was to infuse into the doctrines of the Church the 
fundamental and most distinguishing principle of the Jesuit 
constitution — that which makes monarchism the chief corner- 
stone in all spiritual and temporal government. He was the 
companion and confidant of Loyola, and undoubtedly consid- 
ered himself as executing the purpose for which the society was 
established by him ; that is, to bring the Church, through 
and by means of the papacy, to the point of casting off all 
the influences of the ancient monastic orders, and relying 
alone upon the Jesuits for its main defense in its conflict 
with Protestantism. In this he was serving the society as its 
general, while as the legate of the pope he was serving the 
papacy — manifestly, however, the first being his chief object. 
Considering only these ends, he omitted to notice the im- 
portant fact that Christ, when addressing "a great multitude 
of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered," had instructed 
them to "search the Scriptures" for themselves, because 
therein they would find those things which testify of him.* 
The Council of Trent did not decree the infallibility of 

he would have employed a word having that signification, which in 
the Vulgate would be either curatio or procuratio. He meant, there- 
fore, spiritual food only — advice, counsel, instruction — excluding en- 
tirely the idea of either governing or superintending the opinions or 
consciences of any of the flock. 

4 John v, 39: " Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have 
eternal life; and they are they which testify of me." The words of 
the Latin Vulgate are, "Scrutamini Scripiuras," and of the Greek, 
" ' Epeiwdre rac ypatyac." Each means something more than " search the 
Scriptures " — that is, examine diligently, scrutinize— arid the language 
is that of command. In order to change it into the mere statement of 
a fact, tlie Douay or Roman Catholic Version, and the Rhemish Ver- 
sion — which latter has the "imprimatur" or special preference of 
Archbishop Hughes, of New York, in 1869, and was printed under his 



476 FOOTPRINTS OF TEE JESUITS. 

the pope, and would have failed in the attempt to do so if it 
had been persisted in, on account of the popular odium in 
which that doctrine was held after the schisms brought on by 
the papacy had rendered it absolutely necessary to the life of 
the Church that the Councils of Constance and Basel should 
expressly deny and condemn it, by declaring that a General 
Council, as the representative of the Church, was superior to 
a pope. This was especially necessary with regard to the 
former of these Councils, for the reason that the pontifical 
throne was then claimed by Gregory XII, Benedict XIII, 
and John XXIII, so that no one knew who the true pope 
was. But as John XXIII had possession of the office, he 
was tried by the Council upon "fifty-five heads of accusa- 
tion," and, having been solemnly deposed, Martin V was 
elected in his stead, and constitutes one in the line of papal 
succession. 5 In the face of these well-known facts, however, 
the Council of Trent, under the artful manipulations of 
Laynez, with the pope to back him, went as far as it could 



direct auspices by the " Catholic Puhlication Society " of that city — 
each contains an explanatory note as follows : "Or, you search the Scrip- 
tures;" that is, that Christ merely announced to those present that 
they did so. This was manifestly done in order to hase upon it the 
admonition which immediately follows : " 'T is not a command for all 
to search the Scriptures, but a reproach to the Pharisees" for not 
receiving him of whom the Scriptures testified. This perverts the 
plain meaning ; for at that time Christ did not mention the Pharisees, 
nor did he afterwards do so until he was teaching in the temple. And 
it was accomplished by adding the word "or" to make the note ot 
equivalent meaning with the text, and the word "you," so as to 
make it appear that what Christ said was intended for only those he 
then addressed, and not for all mankind; whereas he undoubtedly 
intended the latter, so that each individual shall understand what 
they testify of him. The command is general, because the object is 
to edify and purify the conscience, and if he meant that others should 
search them for us and we accept as infallibly true their interpretation 
of the testimony, the effect would be to weaken, if not destroy, our 
own sense of personal responsibility. Christ could not have meant 
this, with reference to matters which concern the eternal welfare ol 
the soul. 

6 De Montor, Vol. I, pp. 566-573. 



INTRIGUES AND INTERPRETATIONS. 477 

in that direction, without arousing the popular indignation. 
The legates of the pope — headed by Laynez — would willingly 
have passed a decree of the pope's infallibility, yet there 
were a number of bishops who were not prepared to accept 
the Jesuit theory, that instead of deriving their jurisdiction 
and authority from the divine law, it was derived solely from 
the pope. Besides, the representatives of the monarchs and 
princes were unwilling to concede to the pope the temporal 
authority which the doctrine of his individual infallibility was 
intended to embody in his spiritual sovereignty ; for it was 
easy to see that, if admitted as part of the faith, they would 
hold their kingdoms and authority at his pleasure. 

Although no direct vote was taken in the Council of 
Trent by which the advocates and opponents of infallibility 
could be numerically determined, the whole proceedings prove 
that the foundation was there laid, by its final action, for the 
ultimate triumph of the Jesuit doctrine. Laynez did not 
win the complete victory he hoped for, but obtained advan- 
tages of which his society continued to avail itself for three 
hundred years, when their triumph became complete under 
the pontificate of Pius IX. During that protracted period 
the fortunes of the Jesuits were shifting — favored by some 
popes and opposed by others — but during all these years the 
society clung, with the most stubborn tenacity of purpose, 
to the teachings of Laynez, as announced in the Council 01 
Trent. Notwithstanding the members were held in almost 
universal odium in all the enlightened nations, and the so- 
ciety was tried, convicted of numerous public crimes, and 
suppressed by one of the most distinguished of the popes, and 
found shelter from the popular indignation under protection 
afforded them by the enemies of the Roman Church, they 
at last succeeded in being re-established to serve the "Allied 
Powers " in the defense and preservation of absolute monarch- 
ism. Thus regaining a share of their lost influence under 
the fostering care and patronage of the papacy, they ulti- 
mately became enabled, only about two decades ago, to hold 
the pen and steady the nerves of Pius IX when preparing 



478 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS, 

the decree of his own infallibility and that ot all the popes 
" from St. Peter to the end of the world." Nor were the 
popes themselves idle during these three centuries of conflict 
between progress and retrogression, enlightenment and igno- 
rant superstition. Like skillful politicians, as many of them 
were, they employed the appointing power confided to them 
by the Church to create a large body of cardinals and 
bishops, who were held together, like an army-corps, by 
solemn oaths of fidelity to the papacy. The march of this 
ecclesiastical army was slow from necessity, because those 
who had been supposed to be mere "animals," were gradu- 
ally brought within the light of the Reformation. But it 
w r as steady, nevertheless, for the reason that the stake played 
for was great, and the courage imparted by the Jesuits was 
stimulating. At last the forces were sufficiently consolidated, 
and the cardinals and bishops sufficiently submissive, to haz- 
ard the fortunes of the papacy upon a single cast of the die. 
Accordingly, the Vatican Council of 1870 was brought to 
the point of decreeing the infallibility of all the popes as 
the last resort, in order, if possible, to drive back the waves 
of the Italian Revolution, and rescue the temporal power 
of the papacy from impending destruction, and make its fu- 
ture secure by engrafting a repudiated Jesuit dogma upon 
the settled and recognized faith of the Church. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

CONCLUSION. 

The triumph achieved by the Jesuits in the Vatican 
Council of 1870, by the passage of the decree of papal in- 
fallibility, inspired the most excessive enthusiasm among the 
ecclesiastical defenders of the temporal power. They vainly 
supposed that it was a special intervention of Providence to 
drive back the revolutionary tide and overwhelm the Italian 
insurgents who were seeking merely to establish their right 
to enact such laws as bear upon their temporal interests, 
leaving the ancient faith of the Church, as their fathers had 
maintained it for centuries, entirely undisturbed. Pius IX 
was present in the Council, and when the event was an- 
nounced, excitedly exclaimed, " Consummatus est" consider- 
ing, says the impulsive narrator, that Peter had spoken ! 
The same author, as the historian of the Council, continues : 
"At that instant a terrific thunderstorm burst over the Ba- 
silica. It was occasionally enveloped in profound gloom, and 
the forked lightning darted through and made darkness vis- 
ible, and peal after peal of thunder rumbled over the Council- 
hall and towering dome. All were awestruck at the con- 
vulsion of the elements, and at the mysterious breathings of 
the Holy Ghost, whispering, The pope is infallible !" l 

If, at the seemingly inauspicious moment here described, 
when nature exhibited herself in frowns rather than smiles, 
the excitement had subsided sufficiently for calm deliberation, 
some fear of the Divine displeasure might have been kin- 
dled in view of the blasphemous pretense that a mere man, 



1 The Council of the Vatican. By Thomas Canon Pope. Boston 
Ed., pp. 270-271. 

479 



480 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

with all the impulses, passions, and ambitious vanities of 
other men, was the equal of God in all spiritual and tem- 
poral matters which concern the moral conduct of society 
and Governments, and the eternal welfare of the human 
soul. No body of men ever assembled before, in the course 
of all the ages, had ventured to announce so palpable a per- 
version of the teachings of Christ, whose whole intercourse 
with mankind was designed to teach meekness and humility 
as the distinguishing characteristics of a Christian life. 
Nearly nineteen centuries of the Christian era had passed 
without the consummation of such an infringement upon the 
primitive faith ; and minds not filled with strange infatu- 
ation would have been likely to see in the thunder, the light- 
ning, and the clouds, the manifestation of Divine displeasure 
rather than to have compared the scene — as this writer does — 
to that in the mount when the tables of the law were de- 
livered to Moses. But no such deliberation then existed, 
nor did it attend the proceedings of the Vatican Council. 
The decrees were prepared beforehand under the dictation of 
Pius IX — like those made ready by Innocent III for the 
Lateran Council in 1215, assembled to condemn the pre- 
tended heresies of the Albigenses, to give renewed strength 
to his temporal power, to gloss over his usurpations, and give 
papal sanction to the horrible persecutions of the Inquisition. 
No amendments were allowed. An attempt was made to 
strike out the anathema, but as that would have been a sur- 
render of the coercive power, it failed. The Council — as 
heretofore stated — w^as far from being full when the final 
vote was taken, many members having voluntarily withdrawn 
to signify their opposition to the decree, after having failed 
in every expedient to defeat it. Apart, however, from this 
want of unanimity, it is pretended that this doctrine of in- 
fallibility has been concealed, in some mysterious way, in the 
deposit of faith for all the years since the time of Christ, 
and not revealed, notwithstanding the untiring exertions of 
the ambitious popes to obtain its recognition ! And all this, 
without seeming to realize that to say of this doctrine, as 



CONCLUSION. 481 

well as that of the Immaculate Conception, that belief in 
both is absolutely necessary to salvation in the next life, is 
equivalent to alleging that the millions who have died with- 
out the belief of either, and the other millions who have 
expressly denied and denounced both, have been, and will 
be forever, excluded from the presence of God ! . 

This is a practical age, and the people of the United 
States, considered collectively, are conspicuously a practical 
people. They have become so by virtue of the fact that their 
political institutions have been so constructed as to require the 
personal participation of each citizen in the management of 
public affairs. But if the pope is, in fact, infallible, and 
possessed rightfully of the jurisdiction over faith, morals, 
and conduct, which that doctrine assigns to him, then the 
popular supervision over their affairs ends at the point 
where the papal and Jesuit supervision over them begins. 
Then, instead of continuing in the forefront of the progress- 
ive and advancing nations, we shall occupy an inconspic- 
uous place among those by which progress is condemned as 
infidelity. The pope himself, who has sent Mgr. Satolli here 
to instruct us, seems to have forgotten — and there are multi- 
tudes of his obedient followers who care not to know — that 
the most that his ambitious predecessors, Gregory VII, In- 
nocent III, and Boniface VIII, could accomplish by virtue 
of their assumption of infallibility, was to divide the mem- 
bership of the Church into rival and infuriated factions — the 
Cisalpines and the Ultramontanes. The former adhered to 
the religion of the Gallican Christians by limiting the pope's 
supremacy to spirituals alone ; while the latter, as he now 
does, extended it to absolute spiritual sovereignty to such a 
degree over the world, as includes all temporal matters con- 
cerning the interests of the Church and the papacy. The 
Ultramontanes traced this absolute sovereignty back to the 
lines of policy pursued by several of the most distinguished 
of the popes, but particularly to the bull " Unam Sanctam" 
of Boniface VIII, while the Cisalpines repudiated the author- 
ity of that bull. This issue gave rise to a protracted and 

31 



482 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

angry controversy, which continued up till the Vatican 
Council of 1870, when Pius IX, more successful than any 
of his predecessors, was enabled to profit by his alliance with 
the Jesuits, and secure the triumph of the Ultramontanes. 
This he accomplished by causiug the Council to revive the 
dogmas. of all the popes who had gone before him, includ- 
ing, of course, Gregory VII, Innocent III, and Boniface 
VIII, in so far as they concerned faith, morals, and all re- 
ligious duties and obligations. In the "Dogmatic Constitu- 
tion," which authoritatively announces the infallibility of the 
pope, and was issued under the immediate personal auspices 
of Pius IX, special pains are taken to declare that this doc- 
trine rests not only on the "testimonies of the sacred writ- 
ings," but on "the plain and express decrees" of "the Ro- 
man pontiffs, and of the General Councils," 2 notwithstanding 
no previous Council ever passed such a decree, and those of 
Constance and Basel expressly decided the exact reverse. 
Here, it will be observed, the popes are grouped together by 
the use of the word pontiffs in the plural, leaving the pres- 
ent to be compared with the former faith, by searching among 
the numerous constitutions, decrees, encyclicals, allocutions, 
aud bulls of all the popes enumerated in the calendar of the 
Church. Thus the Ultramontanes and the Jesuits find their 
faith in the bulls and policy of Gregory VII, Innocent III, 
and Boniface VIII, but especially in the bull " Unam Sanc- 
tam" of the latter; and as they, with Leo XIII at their 
head, represent the victorious party in the Church, there 
can be no excuse for not knowing the religious doctrines of 
that party as they are embodied in the infallible utterances 
of that celebrated bull, and are now employed to justify the 
restoration of the pope's temporal power, and the enlargement 
of his spiritual jurisdiction in the event of their success. 

There has been an evident disinclination among the papal 
writers to publish this bull entire, so that its precise purport 
may be understood by the average reader. As an excuse 



2 Vatican Decrees. By Gladstone. Page 159. 



CONCLUSION. 483 

for not doing so, De Montor, the authorized historian of the 
popes, says, in his biography of Boniface VIII, that " neither 
at Rome or elsewhere" is it "any longer officially men- 
tioned." 3 Although this was said before the Vatican Coun- 
cil decreed the infallibility of all the popes, of course includ- 
ing Boniface VIII, yet the concealment of the plain and 
obvious meaning of this bull was not excused even then ; for 
the reason that its whole object was to define the relations 
between the spiritual and the temporal powers ; and, conse- 
quently, furnishes the highest official and ex cathedra evi- 
dence of the faith of the Church as then maintained by its 
chief functionary, whether he was or was not infallible. If, 
however, he was infallible, as the Vatican Council of 1870 
has decreed, then it is conclusively proved that the bull 
" Unam Sanctam" sets forth the true faith as recognized by 
the Ul tramontanes, the Jesuits, and all those who accept 
the popes as infallible teachers and guides. The suppression 
of the most material parts of this bull by De Montor and 
other papal defenders, is but a feeble attempt to disguise the 
censure commonly visited upon its author; although what 
he did was openly and boldly to avow what Gregory VII, 
Innocent III, and other popes had substantially proclaimed 
before, in the regular execution of their pontifical functions. 
De Montor follows De Maistre, and is content, like the 
latter, to state some of its conclusions, omitting the most 
prominent and important. Among the concessions he has 
made is an enumeration of those who are subject to excom- 
munication, as follows: "All heretics;" "All who appeal 
to future Councils" — that is, who deny the pope's infallibil- 
ity ; "Those who cite ecclesiastics before lay tribunals;" 
"Those who usurp the territory of the pope's sovereignty;" 
and, although he ventures to say, "The rest of the bull is 
unimportant,"* the plain fact is, that both he and De Mais- 
tre have omitted any reference to its most prominent parts, 
made now more prominent by the solemn decree of the Vati- 



3De Montor, Vol. I, p. 476. 4 Ibid., pp. 477-478. 



484 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

can Council that he was infallible. Whatsoever may have 
been the object of this suppression previous to the action of 
the Vatican Council — and that there was some special object 
there can be no reasonable doubt — the conditions have since 
changed, so that Boniface VIII, when announciug the faith 
to the whole Church, was as much infallible as Pius IX, or 
Leo XIII, or any of their predecessors. We have seen that 
the decree of infallibility, by its express terms, embraces all 
the " pontiffs," among whom Boniface VIII played a most 
important and conspicuous part. Therefore, what he said 
concerning the relation* between the spiritual and the tem- 
poral powers, which necessarily involves the faith, all who 
assent to the doctrines of the Vatican Council are obliged 
to recognize as infallibly true. Consequently, all modern 
peoples — especially those of the United States — are interested 
in understanding what have been the doctrinal teachings of 
those popes whose potential influence, like that of Boniface 
VIII, has shaped the course of the papacy. If it could once 
have been said, with seeming propriety, that each one of 
the popes spoke and acted for himself, and with reference to 
the period of his pontificate, that time no longer exists ; for, 
since the decree of infallibility, the faithful are obliged to 
recognize each one as having defined the faith by the inspi- 
ration of the Holy Spirit, no matter whether it concerns the 
conduct of nations, peoples, or individuals. 

The bull " Unam Sanctam" was specially intended to de- 
fine the faith, and, therefore, what it contains concerning the 
relations between the spiritual and the temporal powers 
should be scrutinized with the utmost care by those who 
think that the popular form of government is conducive to 
human prosperity and happiness. Especially should this be 
done by the people of the United States, who attribute their 
wonderful growth and development to the separation of 
Church and State, and the subsequent escape from the mul- 
titude of ills inflicted upon the European nations by papal 
and ecclesiastical dominion, not the least of which were jus- 
tified by this celebrated bull of Boniface VIII, to say noth- 



CONCLUSION. 485 

ing now of like assumptions of power by other equally ambi- 
tious popes. The learned and impartial Gosselin has given 
this bull in these words : 

"The gospel teaches us that there are in the Church, and 
that the Church has in her power, two swords — the spiritual 
and the temporal — both in the powers of the Church; but the 
first must be drawn by the Church, and by the arm of the 
sovereign pontiff; the second, for the Church, by the arms 
of kings and soldiers, at the pontiff's request. The temporal 
sword ought to be subject to the spiritual ; that is, the tem- 
poral power to the spiritual, according to these words of the 
apostle, 'There is no power but from God; and those that 
are, are ordained of God.' Now the two powers would not 
be well ordained if the temporal sword were not subject to the 
spiritual, as the inferior to the superior. It can not be denied 
that the spiritual power as much surpasses the temporal in 
dignity, as spiritual things in general surpass the temporal. 
The very origin itself of the temporal power demonstrates 
this; for, according to the testimony of truth, the spiritual 
has the rigid of appointing the temporal power, and of judging it 
when it errs; thus also is verified in the Church, and the 
ecclesiastical power, the oracle of Jeremias : ' Lo, I have set 
thee this day over nations and over kingdoms/ If, therefore, 
the temporal power errs, it must be judged by the spiritual; if the 
spiritual power of inferior rank commits faults, it must be 
judged by a spiritual power of a superior order; but if the 
superior spiritual power commits faidts, it can be judged by God 
alone, and not by any man, according to the words of the 
apostle : ' The spiritual man judgeth all things, and he him- 
self is judged of no man.' This sovereign spiritual power 
has been given to Peter by these words : ' Whomsoever thou 
shalt bind,' etc. Whosoever, therefore, resisteth this power 
so ordained by God, resisteth the order of God." 5 

It is not necessary to a correct understanding of thjs ex- 



6 The Power of the Pope During the Middle Ages. By M. Gos- 
selin. Vol. II, pp. 233-34. 



486 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

traordinary official proclamation that its language should be 
closely scanned. It is an emphatic and obvious assertion of 
complete pontifical jurisdiction over nations, and everything 
connected with their measures of internal policy which per- 
tains to the interests and faith of the Church, or places the 
least limitation upon the powers and prerogatives of the 
popes. It reduces all peoples into a condition of abso- 
lute inferiority, and recognizes the pope as the common 
arbiter of all human affairs, and not responsible to any 
human tribunal. Its main purpose was to weld Church 
and State so closely together that they could never be sep- 
arated, so as to render any form of popular government, 
like that of the United States, impossible. It has been 
locked up among the secret archives of the Vatican for six 
hundred years, along with other pontifical bulls of like 
import, where it might have remained in oblivion had not 
the Vatican Council of 1870 decreed its author to have been 
infallible, and thus dragged it into the full light of day, to 
guide and direct the footsteps of other infallible popes. It 
does not require a vigorous imagination to conceive of the joy 
experienced by the Jesuits when they witnessed the efficient 
support thus given to the cause of monarchism, and with 
what bright hopes they looked forward to the time when the 
papal dominion shall become universal, and no' other form 
of religion be tolerated, except that proclaimed by Boniface 
VIII, when " he declared it to be heretical to say that any 
Christian is not subject to the pope." 6 

All the Jesuits accept as absolutely true the doctrines 
announced by the bull " Unam Sanctam;" otherwise they 
would not be true disciples of Loyola. But whether or no 
others of the faithful consider it binding upon them as an 
act of infallibility, depends, of course, upon the teachings of 
the Church, or of the pope, who, in his single person, repre- 
sents the Church. About three years before the decree of 
infallibility was passed, and in order to mold opinions in its 



e De Montor, Vol. I, p. 47G. 



CONCLUSION. 487 

favor, a work, emanating from the oratory in London 
under papal auspices, was published, wherein the subject was 
discussed with thoroughness. Its title was, " When does the 
Church Speak Infallibly?" and the answer was given with 
satisfactory clearness. In 1870 — the year the decree was 
passed — a second edition of this work was published for 'gen- 
eral instruction. The author is very explicit, and has un- 
doubtedly expressed the belief maintained by the papacy 
with entire correctness ; for if he had not done so, his work 
would not have been printed and circulated under Church 
approval. He does not hesitate to maintain his propositions 
by pontifical proofs as far back as Leo I — more than eight 
hundred years before Boniface VIII — from which, of course, 
it may fairly be inferred that no matter when a pope may 
have lived, his ex cathedra definitions of faith are to be con- 
sidered infallibly true, independent entirely of the late de- 
cree of the Vatican Council. He lays down the general 
proposition that infallibility " extends over all truths which 
have a bearing upon the faith, and upon the eternal welfare 
of mankind," and enforces it by showing that Pius IX de- 
clared that infallible teaching was not confined merely to 
"points of doctrine," but embraced also whatsoever "con- 
cerns the Church's general good and her rights and dis- 
cipline." 7 Besides these, he enumerates as within the papal 
jurisdiction, the "general principles of morality;" "dog- 
matic and moral facts;" "the precise sense of a book, or 
passage of a book," and its conformity to truth ; " discipline 
and worship ;" " the condemnation of secret and other soci- 
ties ;" "education;" "particular moral facts;" "political 
truths and principles;" " theological conclusions;" and "phi- 
losophy and natural sciences." 

Within this broad and almost unlimited range of subjects 
pretty much everything is included which concerns either in- 
dividuals or society — even matters which pertain to nations 



7 When does the Church Speak Infallibly? By Thomas Francis 
Knox, of the London Oratory. Pages 53-54. 



488 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

and States as such. As regards the special subject of educa- 
tion, every system is embraced, because that involves dog- 
matic and moral facts, which gives to the Church the " right 
to judge them ;" and " the faithful are bound to submit with- 
out appeal to her judgment upon these systems." As to po- 
litical truths and principles the doctrine is equally plain, that 
so long as the nation or State is in harmony with the Church, 
acting in obedience to its commands, the latter will not inter- 
fere with it; but w r hen it is not, and contravenes the divine 
law as the Church interprets it, " that moment it is the 
Church's right and duty, as guardian of revealed truth, to 
interfere, and to proclaim to the State the truths which it 
has ignored, and to condemn the erroneous maxims which it 
has adopted ;" that is, to condemn it as heretical and illegit- 
imate. And in order to make it clear that this power over 
the State is unlimited, he refers to the Syllabus of 18G4, of 
Pius IX, to prove that the Church has " the right to distin- 
guish error from truth in the domain of political science." 8 
And before concluding he deems it necessary to caution the 
faithful against any appeal to their own intelligence upon 
" so abstruse" a subject as infallibility, by admonishing them 
''that none but a professed theologian has a right to an opin- 
ion upon it;" that is, that absolute and uninquiring obe- 
dience to authority — even if it reduces mankind to the con- 
dition of stocks and stones — is the highest Christian duty. 9 

Unquestionably the decree of infallibility runs back to 
the earliest ages of the Church, going behind and including 
the whole period of the Middle Ages, which Leo XIII calls 
the " blessed ages" of faith and obedience. Therefore, the 
bull " Unam Sanctam" was within the infallible jurisdiction 
of Boniface VIII, and must be recognized as expressing the 
true papal faith; that is, what the Vaticau Council intended 
should be so considered. If papal infallibility means any- 
thing, it means that he was as incapable of sin or error in 



8 When does the Church Speak Infallibly ? By Thomas Francis 
Knox, of the London Oratory. Page 55, etc. 9 lbid., p. 118. 



CONCLUSION*. 489 

the administration of his office as Pius IX or Leo XIII, 
and, consequently, that his doctrines were absolutely true 
when announced, and remain so to-day. " Semper eadem" — 
always the same — is the papal motto. It must mean also 
that his doctrines are as much a part of the faith, as main- 
tained by the papacy, as was the decree of the Immacu- 
late Conception by Pius IX, or any other act or decree 
concerning the faith, of any of the popes. It can make no 
difference that the decree of the Immaculate Conception was 
approved by the Vatican Council, because it took effect before 
that Council met, by virtue of the recognized power and au- 
thority of the pope. And, besides, its approval was not 
necessary to its validity if Pius IX was infallible, because 
any ex cathedra act of a pope is considered so binding that 
even the dissent of a Council will avail nothing against it. 
Hence, the faithful everywhere are held obliged to accept as 
part of the faith whatsoever any pope has declared, or shall 
hereafter declare, within his infallible jurisdiction, relating 
to the Church, the papacy, States, or Governments, and es- 
pecially to the important subject of education. Without this, 
the doctrine of the pope's infallibility would have no prac- 
tical meaning. 

It remains, consequently, for those whose minds shall be im- 
pressed by the foregoing wel] -attested facts to consider, with 
all possible seriousness, the relations which the infallible pope 
must, from necessity, sustain toward our civil institutions, so 
long as he shall insist upon the extent of jurisdiction over 
them which is now claimed to be conferred by that papal 
pretension. If this consideration shall be given by a Roman 
Catholic citizen of the United States, sheltered and protected 
by our laws, he will surely discover that he is now required 
to abandon the ancient faith of the Church he has venerated 
through life, and substitute for it a new faith which hitherto 
his conscience has rejected, and which required more than 
a thousand years of controversy within the Church and close 
alliance with the revived Jesuits to accomplish. If it be given 
by one "native and to the manner born," whose instinct and 



490 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

education attach him to the form of government which sep- 
arates the State from the Church, and makes the people the 
primary source of political authority, he will find himself 
confronted by the proposition of a foreign power to change 
the character of our institutions, so that Church and State 
may be united, and the latter made subordinate to the former. 
And this will devolve upon all such as duly appreciate the 
benefits of civil and religious liberty, the obligation — not to 
practice intolerance or to deprive any of the just rights of 
citizenship — but to defend, with the necessary firmness and 
courage, all the fundamental principles which were conse- 
crated by the lives and labors of those who laid the founda- 
tions of our Government. We can not afford to have this 
country ruled over either by Leo XIII, who was the pupil 
of the Jesuits in early life, or by the Jesuits themselves, who 
worship Loyola as a saint. We have multitudes of Roman 
Catholics among us, both native and foreign born, whose 
Christian integrity and conduct commend them to our con- 
fidence and fellowship, and many of these are intelligent and 
instructed enough to see that if Jesuitism were eliminated 
from the faith they are required to accept, there would be no 
cause of disturbing strife left between them and their Prot- 
estant fellow-citizens, but each individual would be left to 
worship God according to his own conscience, and no human 
authority would " dare molest or make him afraid." 

We can not and must not permit the followers of Loyola to 
enforce here the principles of Gregory VII, Innocent III, Boni- 
face VIII, and other popes, who dethroned kings and released 
their subjects from the obligation of obedience to the Govern- 
ments under which they lived, upon the pretentious claim that, 
by virtue of their infallibility, they were the sole representa- 
tives of God upon earth, and had the divine authority "of 
appointing the temporal power." We can not and must not 
consent to be included within the circle of any foreign tem- 
poral jurisdiction, or within such spiritual jurisdiction as the 
papal doctrine of infallibility stretches out over the temporal 
affairs of all the nations. We can not and must not allow 



CONCLUSION. 491 

the Stars and Stripes to be removed from the dome of our 
national Capitol, and the papal flag, with its cross and miter 
and without a single star, to be floated in its place. We can 
not and must not mix ourselves up with the affairs of the 
European nations, either to restore the temporal power of the 
pope, or change the relations which the Italian people bear 
to their Government. For we can not do any of these things, 
or suffer them to be done by others, without breaking down 
the barriers and removing the landmarks left by the fathers 
of the Republic, and thereby changing our own bright na- 
tional inheritance into an inglorious bequest to our children. 
We must not forget the claim of jurisdiction over the 
people of the United States which the pope now makes by 
virtue of his assumed infallibility, and which has caused him 
to send Mgr. Satolli to this country — without diplomatic 
recognition and without our knowledge and consent — to in- 
struct us that our form of government is heretical, and may 
for that reason be removed out of the papal pathway, like 
other heresies ; and that our common schools are nurseries of 
vice because they do not teach that Protestantism is also 
heresy, with the curse of God resting upon it. To compre- 
hend the nature and character of this jurisdiction and the 
claim of pontifical supremacy out of which it grows, it is 
only necessary to remember that the Council of Trent as- 
sumed authority over Protestants as well as Roman Catholics, 
and thereby established a precedent which Leo XIII has not 
been slow to follow. That assemblage held all baptized per- 
sons, no matter by whom the ceremony was solemnized, to 
be within its ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and although Prot- 
estants are considered as rebels and apostates against the au- 
thority of the Church, they are regarded as amenable to her 
laws, and may rightfully be required to obey them — peace- 
ably if possible; but if not, then by coercion when it shall 
become expedient to attempt it. They are likened to sheep 
who have strayed from the fold, and as belonging to the 
Master they have left; and to soldiers who desert their flag, 
and are subject to arrest and punishment by their superiors. 



492 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

The Protestant people of the United States are, therefore, 
in the papal sense, excommunicated heretics, and their Gov- 
ernment is heretical because it has separated the State from 
the Church. Consequently, the Jesuits maintain, by their 
peculiarly subtle method of reasoning, that both the Gov- 
ernment and the Protestant people of the United States are 
within the circle of pontifical jurisdiction, and, therefore, that 
the pope has the divine right, as the only infallible repre- 
sentative of God, to deal with this country according to his 
own discretion. 

Both they who teach this and they who accept it as an 
essential part of religious faith, lack the true American spirit, 
whether native or foreign born — that spirit which presided 
over the councils of "the fathers" when they framed our 
Government, and which has given it strength and vigor, as 
well as beauty, for more than a ceutury of time. They are 
manifestly prepared to see the world turned back toward the 
Middle Ages, when the destinies of all the civilized nations 
were subject to the arbitrament and will of the popes ; when 
the State was held in subjugation by the Church ; when kings 
were dethroned and their subjects released from the obliga- 
tion of allegiance to them, in order to bring all the nations 
into conformity with the principles and policy of the papacy; 
and when the masses of mankind were regarded as mere 
"animals," possessing neither the capacity nor the right to 
govern themselves by laws of their own making. To accom- 
plish these results they insist that there shall be absolute 
"unity of faith," and that everything which stands in the 
way of this is heresy and must be destroyed. In order to 
this they claim, as a dogma of faith, that the popes shall 
have free and uninterrupted access, through their hierarchy, 
to every nation and people in the world, so that heretical 
Governments may be destroyed and heretical people brought 
under papal dominion. Herein they indicate a desire to 
see revived in the United States the discord, strifes, and 
wars which scattered ruin and desolation over the fairest 
portions of Europe, which constrained France not to permit 



CONCLUSION. 493 

the bull " Unam Sanctam" to be published within her borders; 
Spain to modify it, and the leading nations — especially those 
acknowledged to be Roman Catholic — to eliminate from all 
papal bulls such features as threatened encroachments upon 
their rights and independence. 

The Protestant people of the United States can not imi- 
tate these latter examples by resorting to harsh and severe 
measures of defense and protection. The civil and religious 
freedom they have established, as the foundation of their in- 
stitutions, must remain universal. No man's conscience must 
be restrained, and no man's just rights invaded or diminished. 
Freedom of thought, of speech, and of the press, must remain 
the chief corner-stone upon which the national edifice shall 
rest. But in order to perpetuate these great rights, so es- 
sential to each and every citizen of the Republic, our common- 
school system, as now prevailing, must be sheltered and pro- 
tected from Jesuit assault. We should even go further, and 
heed the counsel of Madison — one of our wisest and best 
Presidents — when, in one of his messages to Congress, he in- 
vited attention "to the advantages of superadding to the 
means of education provided by the several States a semi- 
nary of learning, instituted by the National Legislature," 
whereby the feelings, opinions, and sentiments of youth may 
be assimilated, and thus constitute a wall of security against 
foreign influences which can never be removed. And 
whether this shall be accomplished or not, duty to both the 
present and the future requires us to remember what the 
great Pope Clement XIV said in his -bull suppressing the 
Jesuits by absolute extinction "forever," that "care be taken 
that they have no part in the government or direction of the 
same" — that is, the schools — because "the faculty of teaching 
youth shall neither be granted nor preserved but to those 
who seem inclined to maintain peace in the schools and tran- 
quillity in the world." He knew the Jesuits far better than 
it is possible for us in this country ever to know them ; and 
whether his act suppressing them was or was not one of in- 
fallibility, it constitutes a lesson of history which ought not 



494 FOOTPRINTS OF THE JESUITS. 

to be forgotten. And while, in our treatment of them, we 
can do nothing at war with the liberal and tolerant spirit of 
our institutions, or unbecoming to ourselves, we should re- 
member that 

"Thrice is he armed that hath his quarrel just; 
And he hut naked, though locked up in steel, 
"Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted." 



INDEX. 



A. 

Alexander, Emperor, expelled 
Jesuits from St. Petersburg 
and Moscow, 246. 

Alexander VI, Pope, grant of, in 
Brazil, 168. 

Antonelli, Cardinal, assumed con- 
trol of papal Government, 
322. 

Andelot, Francis d', a leader of 
the Huguenots, 92. 

Augsburg, National Council or- 
dered at, by Charles V, 467. 

Austria, invaded Italy, 285; es- 
tablished a garrison at Ferrara, 
290; declaration of war against, 
demanded by Italians, 302,308; 
relations of with Sardinia, hos- 
tile, 308 ; requested by Pius IX 
to withdraw troops from Italy, 
311 ; refused to withdraw troops, 
311 ; withdrew troops of her 
own accord, 318. 

Aquinas, Thomas, teachings of, 
recommended by Leo XIII, 
343, 407, 408, 410, 412, 415, 418 ; 
a theological writer in the 
Middle Ages, 407, 413 ; canon- 
ized by Pope John XXII, 408 ; 
doctrines of, taught in Umbria, 
408; doctrines of, as cited by 
Balmes, 409-418; justified dis- 
obedience to civil power, 411, 
414 ; defines de facto Govern- 
ments as not being founded on 



divine law as interpreted by 
popes, 416-418. 
Auvergne, nobility of, interposed 
in behalf of the Jesuits, 106. 

B. 

Balmes, Jesuit writer, condemned 
Protestantism in answer to 
Guizot, 16, 409; died in 1848, 
409; his arguments based on 
doctrines of Thomas Aquinas, 
409-418. 

Baltimore Councils, decrees of, ap- 
proved by Leo XIII, 399, 401, 
and note. 

Basel, Council of, denied the in- 
fallibility of the popes, 436, 467, 
470, 482. 

Bavaria, Duke of, persecuted 
Protestants, 123 ; Jesuits re- 
fused free access to, 264; Jes- 
uits enter surreptitiously, 264. 

Benedict XIII, Pope, confirmed 
decree of Cardinal de Tournon 
and bull of Clement XI against 
Jesuits, 215. 

Benedict XIV, Pope, ordered in- 
vestigation of charges of Portu- 
guese Government against Jes- 
uits, 188; issued two bulls 
condemning Jesuits for idola- 
trous worship, 215. 

Boniface VIII, Pope, maintained 
temporal power by oppressive 
measures, 465, 469. 

495 



496 



INDEX. 



Bourbon, Anthony de, a Hugue- 
not leader, 92. 

Brazil, Portuguese possession of, 
168. 

Brussels, revolution in, 278. 

C. 

Campion and Parson, Jesuit lead- 
ers, visit England and pretend 
to be Protestants, 141. 

Carroll, Charles, signer of Dec- 
laration of Independence, a 
Catholic, 440. 

Cano, Melchior, his opinion of 
Loyola, 75 ; his warning, 76. 

Catherine de Medicis, commanded 
Parliament to ratify letters- 
patent to Jesuits, 102; her 
treachery to French Hugue- 
nots, 105; withdrew from 
Council at Poissy, 107 ; refused 
to sanction Protestant places of 
worship, 111; conspired with 
Jesuits to suppress religious 
worship, 112. 

" Catholic Church and Civil Govern- 
ment, The," by Earnshaw, ex- 
tracts from, 457-461 ; speaks of 
Leo XIII as "The Christ on 
Eartb," 457. 

" Catholic Emancipation," contest 
in England about, 69. 

Cavalho, Sebastian (See Pombal). 

Charles Albert, King of Sardinia, 
defeated at battle of Novara, 
312; abdicated crown in behalf 
of Victor Emmanuel, 312. 

Charles III, of Spain, expelled 
Jesuits from his dominions, 
221. 

Charles V, progress of Jesuits 
during reign of, 81, 84; his 
colonization in South Amer- 
ica, 168 ; compelled the assem- 
bling of Council of Trent, 466 ; 



ordered National Council at 
Augsburg, 467; had a common 
interest with Julius III in 
union of Church and State, 
468. 

Charles IX, of France, controlled 
by Catherine de Medicis, 05. 

Charles X, of France, 273 ; refused 
Jesuits control of colleges and 
schools, 273; issued edict to 
prevent the assembling of 
Chamber of Deputies, 276; 
driven from the throne, 276. 

China, the failure of Xavier to 
enter, 165; Jesuits worshiped 
Confucius in, 197, 206-209; 
Church investigated conduct 
of Jesuits in, 210-215. 

Christians, number of, in the 
world, note, page 464. 

Church and State, united under 
monarchism, 18; separate in 
United States, 18, 344, 356, 358, 
373, 414; separated in Italy, 
19, 334, 337 ; separation of, con- 
sidered heresy by Jesuits, 21; 
separation of, embodies the 
American idea, 26; union of, 
insisted upon by Jesuits, 29, 
37 ; union of, maintained by 
ignorance of the people, 341 ; 
separation of, opposed by popes, 
391 ; views of Catholic writers 
upon, 431 ; Charles V and Ju- 
lius III had common interest 
in maintaining them united, 
468. 

Cisal pines, opposed temporal 
power and repudiated the 
Unam Sanctam of Boniface 
VIII, 481. 

Clement VII, Pope, opposed to 
National Council at Augsburg 
and calls Council of Trent, 467. 

Clement XI, Pope, appointed Car- 



INDEX. 



497 



dinal DeTournon to investigate 
Jesuits in China and India, 
212; confirmed the decrees 
against Jesuit ceremonies, 
214. 

Clement XII, Pope, confirmed 
bulls of previous popes against 
Jesuits, 215. 

Clement XIII, Pope, successor to 
Benedict XIV, 189; continued 
the investigation of Jesuits or- 
dered by Benedict XIV, 192; 
resisted the Parliamentary de- 
cree against Jesuits, 219 ; is- 
sued anathemas against coun- 
tries opposed to Jesuits, 222 ; 
sought the aid of Maria The- 
resa, 223; implored clemency 
of the sovereigns, 223; prom- 
ised to abolish the Society of 
Jesuits, 224 ; his death, 224. 

Clement XIV, Pope, 225; con- 
tinued investigation of the Jesu- 
its, 226, 228-230 ; suppressed the 
order of Jesuits, 216, 227, 231, 
238, 241, 253, 254, 394, 429, 441, 
465, 493 ; his death by poison, 
227, 233. 

College of Cardinals, February 17, 
1878, agreed to maintain pro- 
tests of Pius IX against Gov- 
ernment of Italy, 333, 336. 

Cologne, Archbishop of, letter of 
Leo XIII to, concerning af- 
fairs in Germany, 355. 

Coligny, Admiral de, a leader of 
the Huguenots, 92. 

Conde, Prince of, leader of the 
Huguenots, 92, 100, 106. 

Constance, Council of, decreed the 
extermination of heretics, 362 ; 
denied the pope's infallibility, 
436, 467, 470, 482; deposed 
John XXIII, and elected Mar- 
tin V pope, 476. 



D. 

Daurignac, defense of Loyola 
by, 35, 37. 

Declaration of Independence re- 
pudiated by biographer of Leo 
XIII, 359 ; establishes the prin- 
ciple of perfect equality of 
rights, 361 ; truth of principles 
of, denied by papal system, 
419; signed by Charles Car- 
roll, a Catholic, 440. 

" Dogmatic Constitution." See 
Infallibility. 

E. 

Elizabeth, Queen of England, ef- 
forts to stop Protestantism re- 
newed during reign of, 133; 
preferred the reformed relig- 
ion, 135 ; accused of being ille- 
gitimate, 136, 146, 149 ; declined 
to send ambassadors to Coun- 
cil of Trent, 136; imprisoned 
Mary, Queen of Scots, 136; 
papal indictment against, 136 ; 
pronounced guilty of heresy 
by the pope, 137; the pre- 
tended authority of Pius V 
over, 137; charged with lead- 
ing a licentious life, 140 ; de- 
clined to marry Philip II, 144 ; 
was disposed to prefer Roman 
Catholicism, 144; retained thir- 
teen of Mary's counselors, 
145 ; first attack upon her 
crown made by Henry II, of 
France, 145 ; issued a concilia- 
tory proclamation, 146; her 
proposition rejected by Catho- 
lic bishops, 149. 

England, contest in, about " Cath- 
olic Emancipation," 69 ; quar- 
rel between Henry VIII, King 
of, and pope, 130 ; Henry VIII 
excommunicated, 131 ; Jesuit 



32 



498 



INDEX. 



spies sent to, by Loyola, 131 ; 
Magna Charta of, declared null 
and void by Innocent III, 
359; Roman Catholic bishops 
of, decline to attend corona- 
tion of Elizabeth, 147 ; Parlia- 
ment of, repealed statutes of 
Mary, 148 ; Catholic bishops 
of, reject proposition of Eliza- 
beth, 149 ; Radicals of, excom- 
municated by Pius VII, 266. 
English College, established at 
Rome, by Jesuits, 134. 

F. 

Ferdinand IV, of Naples, Jesuit 
sympathy for, 259. 

Ferdinand VII, of Spain, abol- 
ished the Cortes, 260 ; restored 
the Inquisition, 260 ; death of, 
262. 

Ferrara, garrison established at, 
by Austrians, 290. 

France, Parliament of, compels 
Jesuits to surrender their con- 
stitution, 49-50, 194, 218 ; uni- 
versities of, condemn infalli- 
bility, 70 ; opposition to Jesuits 
in, 89 ; Parliament and univer- 
sities of, oppose Jesuits, 96, 
102, 101; Gallican Christians 
of, oppose Jesuits, 90; influ- 
ences of the Reformation in, 
92; persecution of Protestants 
in, 92-93; Inquisition in, es- 
tablished by Cardinal Lor- 
raine, 94; letters-patent admit- 
ting Jesuits to, granted by 
King of, 95; letters-patent ad- 
mitting Jesuits to, rejected by 
Parliament, 95, 102, 103, 105; 
Council at Poissy, 101, 106; 
Jesuits admitted to Paris con- 
ditionally, 110; Parliament of, 
denounced Jesuits, 219 ; Jesuit 



demand to control education 
in, refused by Charles X, 273; 
conspiracy of Catherine de 
Medicis and Jesuits to suppress 
freedom of religious worship 
in, 112; Jesuits refused free 
access to and surreptitiously 
enter, 264; concordat of Pius 
VII defeated by Catholics of, 
265; Democrats of, excommu- 
nicated by Pius VII, 266 ; elec- 
tion of Chamber of Deputies 
of, in 1830, 275 ; the war be- 
tween Prussia and, a blow at 
Pius IX, 319; Legislative As- 
sembly of, denounced by Pius 
VI, 441. 

Franchi, Cardinal, death of, 344. 

Francis I, executions for heresy 
during the reign of, 92; re- 
fused Jesuits free access to 
France, 264. 

Francis II, persecution of Prot- 
estants by, 93; induced by 
Catherine de Medicis to issue 
n»3w letters-patent admitting 
Jesuits to France, 103. 

Franco, P., Catholic writer, on 
relations of Church to Secular 
Government, 443-456 ; desig- 
nates free governments god- 
less, 446; denounces Freema- 
sonry, 446; declares oaths 
against the Church not bind- 
ing, 447 ; asserts supreme au- 
thority of the pope, 447 ; says 
priests must enter politics, 
449; denies right of religious 
liberty, 449 ; denounces liberty 
of the press, 451 ; condemns 
sovereignty of the people, 451; 
considers liberalism a form of 
heresy, 454; enumerates im- 
portant propositions of Sylla- 
bus'of Pius IX, 455; opposes 



INDEX. 



499 



education in public schools, 
456. 

G. 

Gallican Christians in France 
opposed Jesuits, 90. 

Garibaldi united the Two Sicilies 
with Sardinia, 313; defeated 
by the French, 318. 

Gladstone, his list of heretical 
popes, 68-69. 

Germany, the Church in, attacked 
by Loyola, 36, 114; influences 
of Reformation in, 73, 115, 117, 
128 ; Roman Catholics and 
Protestants in harmony in, be- 
fore entry of the Jesuits, 115, 
127 ; Jesuits establish colleges 
in, 122; opposition to Jesuits 
in, 263; hatred of Jesuits 
shared alike by Catholics and 
Protestants in, 265; concordat 
of Christians of, refused by 
Pius VII, 266; persecution of 
Protestants in, 124; the Illu- 
minati of, excommunicated by 
Pius VII, 266 ; letter from Leo 
XIII to Archbishop of Co- 
logne concerning affairs in, 
355. 

Gibbons, Cardinal, encyclical of 
pope to, approving decision of 
Satolli upon school question, 
398. 

Guizot, French historian, replied 
to by Jesuit writer, Balmes, 
16, 409. 

Greek Church, number of mem- 
bers of in the world, note, 
page 464. 

Gregory VII, Pope, maintained 
temporal power by oppressive 
measures, 465, 469. 

Gregory XVI, Pope, elected 1831, 
282; no personal enmity to, 



282 ; requested Louis Philippe, 
of France, to send army to 
Italy to punish Catholics, 284 ; 
relied upon pledges of the 
Holy Alliance, 284 ; request of, 
to Louis Philippe, declined, 
284; invited the Emperor of 
Austria to invade Italy, 285, 
289; his encyclical letter an- 
nouncing his pontifical policy, 
286, 403 ; claimed infallibility, 
288 ; re-established pontifical 
authority under Austrian pro- 
tection, 290 ; died 1846, 291. 

H. 

Henry, King of Navarre (Henry 
IV), a leader of the Hugue- 
nots, 92; represented Hugue- 
nots and Protestant sentiment 
at Council of Poissy, 106. 

Henry II, of France, opposed the 
Reformation, 92 ; executions 
for heresy during reign of, 92 ; 
granted letters-patent to Jes- 
uits to enter Paris, 95 ; attacked 
the right of Elizabeth to the 
crown, 145. 

Henry VIII, of Eugland, his 
quarrel with the pope, 130; 
visited his vengeance upon 
both Protestants and Catholics, 
143. 

"Holy Alliance," the, and Pius 
VII, 249-271 ; met at Verona, 
261 ; combinations arising 
from, maintained the Nether- 
land's Government, 278; or- 
ganized to suppress the right 
of self-government, 280, 350 ; 
relied upon! by Gregory XVI, 
284; relations of to Pius IX, 
296; looked upon with dis- 
favor in France, 284. 

Huss, John, burned, 428. 



500 



INDEX. 



I. 

India, idolatrous worship of Jes- 
uits in, 196-206; Jesuit con- 
verts in, 202; Jesuit baptisms 
in, in 1737, 203. 

Infallibility, doctrine of, declared 
by Conciliar Decree, ca 1 1 e d 
" Dogmatic Constitution," in 
1870, 19, 321, 427, 428, 471, 478 ; 
dictated by Pius IX, 68, 321, 
427, 480 ; the consummation of 
the Jesuit plan, 19; rejected 
by Italian people, 20; Jesuit 
arguments on, 21-23; con- 
demned by universities in 
France and Spain, 70 ; opposed 
by Gallican Church, 89 
claimed by Gregory XVI, 288 
Jesuit interpretation of, 354 
interpretation of Leo XIII of, 
354; struggle between Church 
and papacy about, 428 ; decree 
of, the proudest Jesuit triumph 
since their restoration, 428 ; 
denned by Catholic writer, 430 ; 
decree of, not passed unani- 
mously, 433, 480 ; never recog- 
nized as a dogma of religious 
faith, 435; denied by Councils 
of Pisa, Constance, and Basel, 
436, 467, 470, 482; results to 
be expected from, 438-439; 
incompatible with American 
citizenship, 456; divided the 
Church into rival factions of 
Cisalpines and Ultramontanes, 
481. 

Innocent III, Pope, declared 
Magna Charta of England null 
and void, 359 ; instructed the 
faithful to exterminate her- 
etics, 362; maintained tempo- 
ral power by oppressive meas- 
ures, 465, 469 ; dictated decrees 
of Lateran Council, 480. 



Innocent X, Pope, his questions to 
Congregation of the Propaganda 
concerning Jesuit idolatrous 
worship, 210 ; his decree 
against Jesuits, 211. 

Isabella, of Spain, proclaimed 
a liberal constitution, 262. 

Italy, revolution in, 1870, 19 ; abol- 
ished temporal power, 19, 22, 
24, 464 ; separated Church from 
State, 19, 334, 337 ; established 
constitutional form of govern- 
ment, 19; Jesuits driven 
from, 19, 309, 337, 393; Car- 
bonari of, excommunicated by 
Pius VII, 266; revolutions in, 
282-294 ; invaded by Austrians, 
285; Austrian garrison estab- 
lished at Ferrara, 290; people 
of, demand Pius IX to declare 
war against Austria, 302 ; king- 
dom of, formed by Victor Em- 
manuel, 313 ; Austrian armies 
withdrawn from, 318 ; unifica- 
tion of, established, 323, 329 ; 
capital of, established at Rome, 
329; freedom of belief funda- 
mental principle of govern- 
ment of, 348 ; aid of Americans 
sought by papacy to secure 
restoration of temporal power 
in, 348; form of government 
of, condemned by Leo XIII, 
378 ; law of Umbria condemned 
by Cardinal Pecci (Leo XIII), 
376. 

J. 

Jane, Princess, espouses Jesuit 
cause at Saragossa, 81. 

Japan, visited by Francis Xavier, 
162-165. 

Jerome, burned, 428. 

Julius III, Pope, authorized Loy- 
ola to establish German col- 
lege in Rome, 121, 422; had 



INDEX, 



501 



common interest with Charles 
V in union of Church and 
State, 468 ; formed alliance 
with Jesuits, 468. 

John III, of Portugal, his coloni- 
zations in South America, 168 ; 
sent the first Jesuits to South 
America, 170. 

John XXII, Pope, canonized 
Thomas Aquinas in 1323, 408. 

John XXIII, Pope, deposed by 
Council of Constance, 476. 

Jesuits, the, founded by Loyola, 
32, 49 ; the enemies of civil 
and religious liberty, 28, 439; 
consider the separation of 
Church and State heresy, 21 ; 
insist that Church and State 
shall be united, 29, 37 ; opposed 
to intellectual progress, 49 ; 
monarchists, 66 ; general of, 
has absolute authority, 38, 40, 
45, 47, 48, 51-62; general of, 
equal to God, 32, 40, 51, 55, 57, 
58, 59, 70, 71, 72; authority of 
general superior to pope, 72; 
efforts of, to restore temporal 
power, 24, 27, 28 ; expelled 
from Rome by Pius IX, 19, 309, 
337, 393 ; in the United States, 
25, 29 ; intrigues of, at Sara- 
gossa, Spain, 76-83 ; opposed 
at Toledo, Spain, 84 ; entered 
Portugal, 86 ; established col- 
lege at Coimbra, 86; acquired 
immense wealth, 86 ; opposed 
in France, 89 ; resisted by Gal- 
lican Christians, 90; letters- 
patent granted to, by Henry 
II, 95 ; opposed by University 
of Paris, 96 ; driven out of 
Paris, 96, 220 ; established col- 
leges at Clermont and Pamiers, 
99-100; at Council of Trent, 
108, 469; admitted to Paris 



conditionally, 110; conspired 
to suppress freedom of relig- 
ious worship in France, 112 ; 
exerted their influence in Ger- 
many through the schools, 
120; established colleges in 
Germany, 122 ; persecuted Prot- 
estants in Germany, 123-124 ; 
sent as spies against Henry VIII, 
131; visited Scotland and Ire- 
land, 132; established English 
college at Rome, 134; their 
education of English youths, 
134, 139 ; Semper eadem the 
motto of, 138; sent to England 
from French seminaries, 140; 
Campion and Parson sent to 
England from Rome, 140 ; first 
important mission of, was to 
East Indies, 153 ; King of Por- 
tugal sent the first of, to South 
America, 170 ; established mon- 
archical government in Para- 
guay, 171, 173 ; the Reductions, 
or Jesuit State, established in 
Paraguay by, 174; their con- 
flict with Portuguese Govern- 
ment in Paraguay, 178 ; sup- 
pressed in Paraguay by Pombal, 
181-194; became Brahmins in 
India, 196; worshiped Confu- 
cius in China, 197, 206-209; 
converts of , in India, 202; bap- 
tisms of, in India, 203 ; society 
of, suppressed by Clement 
XIV, 216, 227, 231, 238, 241, 
253, 254, 394, 429, 441, 465, 493 ; 
banished from Portugal, 218, 
291 ; denounced by French 
Parliament, 219 ; expelled from 
European countries, 221-222, 
393 ; resist the brief of suppres- 
sion, 239, 257; in Russia, 239, 
242-247, 254; re-enter Parma 
and Sicily, 245 ; expelled from 



502 



INDEX. 



St. Petersburg and Moscow, 
246 ; re-established by PiusVII, 
236, 247, 249, 250, 252, 253, 259; 
427 ; property of, in Rome re- 
stored to them, 259 ; ^intro- 
duction of, into Spain, 260 ; 
again driven out of Spain, 262 ; 
opposed in Germany, 263 ; sur- 
reptitiously enter France, 264; 
demanded control of educa- 
tional institutions in France, 
273; welcomed at Austrian 
court, 285; influence of, over 
Pius IX, 310, 327 ; instrumen- 
tal in procuring decree of in- 
fallibility, 321 ; interpretation of 
infallibility by, 354 ; condemned 
United States institutions as 
heretical, 420; threaten their 
public-school system, 421 ; or- 
der of, and not the Church, 
benefited by pope's policy, 393 ; 
duty of educators assigned to, 
by Leo XIII, 394, 422 ; theory 
of, maintained by Leo XIII, 
390; decree of infallibility, 
greatest triumph of, since their 
restoration, 428; the Church 
of less consequence to, than 
the society, 436; seeking to 
control common schools, 440 ; 
find their faith in bulls of 
Gregory VII, Innocent III, 
and Boniface VIII, 482; the 
constitution of, exposed by 
French Government, 49-50, 
194, 218. 

L. 

Lateran Council, decrees of, dic- 
tated by Innocent III, 480. 

Laynez, accompanied Loyola to 
Home, 44 ; successor to Loyola, 
102, 107-108 ; at the Council of 
Poissy, 102 ; went to Council 



of Trent as legate of the pope, 
108,469-478; remonstrated 
against erection of Protestant 
places of worship in France, 
111 ; announced the doctrine 
of infallibility in Council of 
Trent, 470, 471, 472-475 ; per- 
verted the Scriptures, 473, and 
notes, pages 474, 475. 

Lefevre, accompanied Loyola to 
Rome, 44. 

Leo XII, Pope, 271 ; demanded 
clergy of France be made in- 
dependent of government, 272 ; 
his demand condemned by 
Louis XVIII, 272 ; anathema- 
tized Protestantism, 272; death 
of, 274. 

Leo XIII, Pope, election of, 333, 
336 ; possesses high intellectual 
qualities and Christian char- 
acter, 334, 345, 366 ; his educa- 
tion and training Jesuitical, 
336, 346, 349, 354, 383 ; his first 
encyclical reasserts temporal 
power, 337-345 ; instructions of, 
to priests and laymen, 343; rec- 
ommends teachings of Thom- 
as Aquinas, 343, 407, 408, 410, 
412, 415, 418 ; hostile to public 
schools, 343, 358, 391; condemns 
civil marriage, 344, 358 ; com- 
mands obedience to superiors, 
344 ; appointed Cardinal Nina 
his Secretary of State, 344 ; 
condemns separation of 
Church and State, 344; 
theories of, expounded by his 
biographer, 347-365 ; rebuked 
the Catholic press, 352; cen- 
sorship of the press by, in- 
tended to be universal, 353; 
letter of, to Archbishop of 
Cologne, concerning German 
affairs, 355 ; his views when 



INDEX. 



503 



Cardinal (see Peccil ; argu- 
ments of, upon temporal power, 
370, 372; condemns form of 
government in Italy, 378 ; de- 
fined universal faith to be ab- 
solute sovereignty of pope, 379 ; 
alarmed by liberal Catholicism, 
388 ; assigns to Jesuits the 
duty of educators, 394, 422; 
seeking to create a politico-re- 
ligious party in United States, 
396 ; sentMgr. Satolli to United 
States, 396 ; approves decision 
of Satolli upon school ques- 
tion, in encyclical to Cardinal 
Gibbons, 398 ; conditions of, 
attached to approval of Satol- 
li's decision, 399 ; approves de- 
crees of Baltimore Councils, 
399, 401 ; demands that Cath- 
olic schools must be promoted, 
401, 402 ; doctrines of, in sym- 
pathy with Jesuit theory, 390; 
maintains the government has 
no rightful jurisdiction over 
Church, 415 ; striving for tem- 
poral power, 427 ; addressed as 
" Cheist on earth " by Cath- 
olic writer, 457. 

Lorraine, Cardinal of, established 
the Inquisition in France, 94 ; 
established Jesuit seminary at 
Rheims, 140. 

Louis Philippe, 276; requested 
by Gregory XVI to send army 
to Italy, 284 ; declined request 
of Gregory XVI, 284. 

Louis XV, convened Synod of 
the clergy, 220; annulled de- 
cree of Parliament against Jes- 
uits, 221. 

Louis XVI, aided by Pius VI, 
441. 

Louis XVIII, invaded Spain, 
262; refused to allow Jes- 



uits to openly enter France, 
264 ; agreed to concordat of 
Pius VII, 265. 
Loyola, Ignatius, founder of the 
society of Jesuits, 32, 49 
claimed equality with God 
32, 40, 51, 55, 57, 58, 59, 70, 71 
72, 97 ; represented as possess 
ing miraculous powers, 32, 155 
164 ; his life written by Raba- 
denira, 32; the suppression of 
the Reformation and extirpa- 
tion of Protestantism his 
avowed purpose, 33, 93, 469; 
his shrewdness, 34, 50, 71, 72; 
defended by Daurignac, 35, 37 ; 
his argument to Paul III, 36 ; 
attacked the Church in Ger- 
many, 36 ; the ambition of, 
37-38, 67 ; his society not nec- 
essary to Christian faith, 39; 
started as missionary to Holy 
Land, 41, 43; duplicity of, 42; 
his expedition to Palestine a 
failure, 43; asked the pope to 
approve his society, 43 ; named 
his order " The Society of Jesus," 
44; his society approved by 
Paul III, 48 ; neither a theolo- 
gian nor learned, 50 ; worshiped 
as a saint, 63, 490 ; Melchior 
Cano's opinion of, 75 ; triumph 
of, at Toledo, Spain, 85; oppo- 
sition to in France, 89; estab- 
lished German college in Rome, 
121, 422. 

M. 

Madison, President, advised edu- 
cation of youth in science of 
government, 15, 493. 

Magna Charta, of England, de- 
clared null and void by Inno- 
cent III, 359. 

Maigrot, Bishop of Conon, for- 



504 



INDEX. 



bade idolatrous ceremonies of 
Jesuits, 212. 

Martin V, Pope, elected in place 
of John XXIII, 476. 

Mary, Queen of England, marriage 
of to Philip II brought calami- 
ties to England, 142; statutes 
of, repealed by English Parlia- 
ment, 148. 

Mary Queen of Scots, imprisoned 
by Elizabeth, 136. 

Maximilian Joseph, of Bavaria, 
denied access to Jesuits, 264. 

Monroe Doctrine, 350 ; note, page 
262. 

Montagu, English statesman 
maintained temporal power, 
458. 

Morales, sent to China to investi- 
gate Jesuits, 210; banished 
from China, 210. 

N. 

Napoleon I, 258; letter of, to 
Pius VII, concerning temporal 
power, 269. 

Napoleon III, advised Pius IX to 
let the revolted provinces go, 
313; sent troops to Italy to 
protect temporal power, 318; 
withdrew troops from Italy, 
319. 

Netherlands, the, Government of, 
maintained by the Holy Alli- 
ance, 278. 

Nina, Cardinal, Secretary of State 
to L,eo XIII, 344. 

Nobili, Jesuit missionary to In- 
dia, 198 ; assumed the character 
of a Brahmin, 199 ; summoned 
to Goa to explain his conduct, 

205. 

O. 

O'Reilly, biographer of Leo XIII, 
expounds the theories of the 



popes, 347-365 ; repudiates the 
Declaration of Independence, 
359 ; maintains Thomas 
Aquinas must be taught in 
schools in United States, 408. 

P. 

Palmyra, Archbishop of, book of, 
forbidden at Rome, and placed 
on the Prohibitory Index, 417. 

Paul III, Pope, issued bull approv- 
ing the Jesuits, 48, 216; as- 
sembled the Council of Trent, 
67, 467 ; excommunicated 
Henry VIII, 131 ; endeavored 
to induce Charles V and 
Francis I to invade England, 
131 ; solicited aid of Loyola 
against Henry VIII, 131. 

Para, Bishop of, appointed dele- 
gate to Cardinal Saldanha, 190; 
suspended Jesuits from func- 
tions of confessors and pulpit, 
190. 

Paraguay, Jesuit government in, 
monarchical, 171, 173 ; Euro- 
peans prohibited entering, 173 ; 
reductions established by Jes- 
uits in, 174 ; character of gov- 
ernment in reductions, 174- 
177 ; conflict between Jesuits 
and Portuguese Govern ment in, 
178 ; Jesuits suppressed by 
Pombal in, 181-194. 

Paris, Bishop of, denounced in- 
fallibility, 473 ; university of, 
opposed Jesuits, 96 ; Jesuits 
driven out of, 96, 220 ; Jesuits 
admitted to, conditionally, 110. 

Parson, Jesuit leader, visited 
England with Campion, and 
pretended to be a Protestant, 
141. 

Passionei, Cardinal, Secretary to 
Benedict XIV, 188. 



INDEX. 



505 



Pecci, Cardinal (Leo XIII) elected 
pope, 333, 336 ; denounced 
Italian revolution, 367, 375 ; 
considered temporal power a 
divine institution, 368 ; upon 
spiritual sovereignty of the 
pope, 373 ; condemned the law 
of Umbria, 376 ; chosen to pro- 
test to Piedmont against in- 
fringement of papal rights, 380 ; 
condemned freedom of con- 
science, 383 ; claimed education 
should be under the direction 
of the Church, 384; drew up 
constitution for Academy of 
St. Thomas Aquinas, 407. 

Peter, Apostle, alleged to have 
been the first pope, 435, 436, 
472, 473, 478. 

Philip II, his marriage to Mary, 
Queen of England, brought ca- 
lamities to England, 142 ; hatred 
of, for Protestants, 143; his 
proposal of marriage to Eliza- 
beth refused, 144. 

Philip III, approved the Jesuit 
State in Paraguay, 174. 

Philip IV, favored Jesuits in Para- 
guay, 174. 

Piedmont, formed an alliance with 
Sardinia, 308. 

Pisa, Council of, denied the pope's 
infallibility, 436. 

Pius V, pope, pretended author- 
ity of, over Elizabeth, 137. 

Pius VI, pope, sustained the de- 
cree of Clement XIV, 237, 240 ; 
condemned the efforts of the 
French to establish a Republic, 
and the Legislative Assembly, 
441. 

Pius VII, pope, re-established the 
Jesuits, 236, 247, 249, 250, 252, 
253, 259, 427; authorized the 
order of Jesuits in White 



Russia, 244, 254; relations of 
to Holy Alliance, 249-271 ; his 
concordat to Louis XVIII con- 
cerning temporal power, 265 ; 
his concordat defeated by Cath- 
olics of France, 265; refuses 
assent to concordat of German 
Christians, 266 ; excommuni- 
cated liberal Christians in 
France, Germany, England, 
and Italy, 266 ; rejected prop- 
osition of Napoleon concern- 
ing temporal power, 270 ; death 
of in 1823, 271. 

Pius VIII, pope, elected 1829, 274; 
circular letter of, to "the 
bishops of Christendom," 274. 

Pius IX, pope, 291 ; possessed ex- 
cellent personal qualities, 292 ; 
accepted as a reformer, 293, 
297 ; his election by Conclave 
of Cardinals, 293 ; his decree 
of amnesty, 294; his popular- 
ity, 296 ; relations of, to the 
Holy Alliance, 296 ; compelled 
to expel Jesuits from Rome, 
19, 309, 337, 393 ; rejects over- 
ture of pacification from Victor 
Emmanuel, 23, 321 ; declared 
infallible, 321, 427, 428, 471, 
478 ; dictated the doctrine of 
infallibility, 68, 321, 427, 480 ; 
his decree establishing the Im- 
maculate Conception as a 
dogma of faith, 436 ; impor- 
tant propositions of his Syl- 
labus enumerated, 455 ; his 
reforms aimed to perpetuate 
temporal power, 299 ; his dec- 
laration of temporal power, 
300 ; created a " Civic Guard," 
300 ; his vanity, 301 ; d e- 
manded by Italians to declare 
war against Austria, 302 ; not 
a statesman, 303 ; his decla- 



506 



INDEX. 



ration in favor of the A ustrians, 
305 ; influences of the Jesuits 
over, 310, 327 ; adhered to doc- 
trine of temporal power, 310, 
315; requested Austria to with- 
draw troops from Italy, 311 ; 
requested co-operation of Sar- 
dinia in forming a confederacy 
with pope as ruler, 311 ; re- 
jected advice of Louis Napo- 
leon, 313 ; condemned new 
Government of Italy, 315, 326 ; 
took refuge in Castle of St. 
Angelo, 322 ; returned to Rome, 
328; his death, 328; his allo- 
cution amending the Confes- 
sion of Faith, 330-332; con- 
demned public schools in Syl- 
labus, 1864, 403. 

Poissy, Council of, 101, 106; Lay- 
nez at, 102. 

Pole, Cardinal, opposed introduc- 
tion of Jesuits into England, 
132. 

Polignac, Prime Minister of 
Charles X, 276. 

Pombal (Sebastian Cavalho), sup- 
pressed the Jesuits in Para- 
guay, 181-194. 

Popes, opposed to separation of 
Church and State, 391 ; num- 
ber of, 435 ; opposed to a Gen- 
eral Council, 466, 467 ; main- 
tained temporal power by op- 
pressive measures, 465, 469 ; 
strove to perpetuate infallibil- 
ity, 468 ; condemn principles 
of United States Government, 
391, 411, 419, 420, 461. 

Portugal, Jesuits enter and ac- 
quire immense wealth, 86 ; es- 
tablish college at Coimbra, 86 ; 
possessions of, in India, 153, 
154 ; king of, sends Xavier to 
India, 154 ; possession of Brazil, 



168 ; Royal Council, 1757, 183 
government of, prepared state- 
ment of grievances against 
Jesuits, 184; Jesuits suppressed 
in, 218, 291. 

Protestants, number of, in the 
world, note page 464 ; of the 
United States excommunicated 
in the papal sense, 492. 

Protestantism, condemned by 
Balmes, 16, 17, 409 ; its extir- 
pation the purpose of Loyola, 
33; the controlling power in 
human affairs, 33 ; anathema- 
tized by Leo XII, 272. 

Prussia, war between France and, 
a blow at Pius IX, 319. 

Public-school system assailed, 16, 
394, 421 ; pope hostile to, 343, 
358, 391 ; division of sentiment 
among Roman Catholics in 
United States concerning, 397 ; 
decision of Satolli on, 397 ; 
Satolli's views of, approved oy 
pope, 398; condemned by Pius 
IX, 403 ; Jesuits striving to 
control, 440. 

R. . 

Rabadenira, biographer of Lo- 
yola, 32. 

Reformation, the, its suppression 
of Loyola's purpose, 33, 93, 469 ; 
its influences in Germany, 73, 
115, 117, 128; influences of, in 
France, 92 ; events transpiring 
in Europe during, 124-127. 

Roman Catholics, appealed to by 
Jesuits to restore temporal 
power, 24; revolutions in States 
of, 267, 268 ; revolutionary fer- 
vor increased under Leo XII, 
271 ; conflict in Italy was be- 
tween papac} r and, 285 ; in 
United States instructed that 



INDEX. 



507 



loss of temporal power is an 
international question, 363 ; 
estimated number of, in United 
States, 392 ; number of, in the 
world, note, page 464; senti- 
ment concerning common 
schools divided among, 397 ; 
schools of, must be sedulously- 
promoted, 401, 402 ; required 
to teach doctrines of Thomas 
Aquinas in schools, 412, 415, 
418 ; patriotism o f , i n the 
United States, 422, 490 ; mul- 
titudes of, lovers of civil and 
religious liberty, 425. 

Roman Catholic writers, Congress 
of, at Rome, 351; rebuked 
by Leo XIII, 352 ; disinclined 

• to publish the bull " Unam 
Sanctam " of Boniface VIII in 
full, 482. 

Rome, Bishop of, acquired title of 
pope in the sixth century, 22 ; 
Jesuits expelled from, by Pius 
IX, 19, 309, 337, 393 ; property 
of Jesuits in, restored to them, 
259 ; Victor Emmanuel enters, 
23, 322 ; Pius IX fugitive from, 
322 ; Pius IX returned to, 328 ; 
capital of Italy established at, 
329, 337; English college es- 
tablished in, by Jesuits, 134; 
German college established 
in, by Loyola, 121, 422. 

Russia, Jesuits in, 239, 242-247 ; 
Jesuit order authorized in 
White Russia by Pius VII, 244, 
254; Jesuits expelled from St. 
Petersburg and Moscow, 246. 

S. 

Saldanha, Cardinal, appointed 
visitor and reformer of the 
Jesuits, 189; banished the 



Father Superior of the Jesuit 
" Professed House," and caused 
arrest of two Jesuits in Brazil, 
190; appointed the Bishop of 
Para his delegate in South 
America, 190. 

Saragossa, Jesuit intrigues at, 
76-83. 

Sardinia, hostility of, to Austria, 
308 ; formed alliance with Pied- 
mont for protection, 308 ; in- 
vited by Pius IX to co-operate 
in forming confederacy of Ital- 
ian republics with pope as 
ruler, 311 ; declined to co-oper- 
ate with Pius IX, 311 ; became 
separated from influences of 
Holy Alliance, 312 ; crown of, 
abdicated by Charles Albert, 
312 ; Victor Emmanuel became 
king of, 312. 

Satolli, Mgr., deputy pope, sent 
to United States by Leo XIII, 
396 ; decision of, upon school 
question, 397 ; results to be ex- 
pected from success of his 
mission, 427. 

Semper eadem, the Jesuit motto, 
138 ; the motto of the papacy, 
489. 

Spain, universities of, condemned 
infallibility, 70 ; Jesuits in, 75- 
85; Jesuit intrigues at Sara- 
gossa, 76-83 ; opposition to 
Jesuits at Toledo, 84 ; acquired 
possessions in South America, 
168; king of, prohibits Euro- 
peans entering Paraguay, 173 ; 
invaded by Louis XVIII, of 
France, 262; Jesuits driven out 
of, 221, 262, 291. 

Syllabus of Pius IX, important 
propositions of, enumerated by 
Franco, 455. 



508 



INDEX. 



T. 

Temporal power, abolished in 
Italy, 19, 22, 24, 464; Jesuit 
efforts to restore, 24, 27, 28; 
Napoleon's letter to Pius VII, 
concerning, 269, 270; doctrine 
of, maintained by Pius IX, 
299-301, 310, 315; Union of 
Sardinia and Italy, death-blow 
to, 313, 319; Louis Napoleon 
sent troops to Italy to protect, 
318; abolished, 324, 329; its 
restoration sought through aid 
of American people, 348 ; res- 
toration of, would convert 
pope into a king, 362 ; not ac- 
quired until after fall of Roman 
Empire, 386 ; its abolition as- 
serted to be an international 
wrong by Leo XIII, 423; an 
enemy to peace of the Church, 
463 ; importance of issue in- 
volved in restoration of, 464. 

Trent, Council of, assembled by 
Paul III, 67, 467 ; Jesuits at, 
108, 469 ; Elizabeth declined to 
send ambassadors to, 136; 
forced to assemble by Charles 
V,466; called by Clement VII, 
467 ; Laynez announced doc- 
trine of infallibility in, 470, 
471,472-475 ; did not decree in- 
fallibility, 475; assumed au- 
thority over both Protestants 
and Catholics, 491. 

Tournon, De, Cardinal, condemns 
Jesuits in China and India, 
212 ; his arrest and death, 214. 

U. 

Ultramontanes, advocated tem- 
poral power and policy of bull 
" Unarn Sanctam " of Boniface 
VIII, 481, 482, 483. 

Umbria, law of, condemned by 



Cardinal Pecci (Leo XIII), 
376 ; archbishop and bishops of, 
select Pecci to protest against 
the infringement of papal 
rights by Piedmont, 380; doc- 
trines of Thomas Aquinas 
taught in schools of, 408. 
Unam Sanctam, bull of Boniface 

VIII, 481, 482, 483, 484, 485, 
488, 493; disinclination of 
pipal writers to publish in full, 
482. 

United States, policy of, to sep- 
arate Church from State, 18, 
344, 356, 358, 373, 414 ; Jesuits 
in, 25, 29; maintains the right 
of self-government, 335; free- 
dom of conscience a funda- 
mental principle of, 348, 360; 
people of, appealed to by pa- 
pacy to restore temporal power 
in Italy, 348; estimated num- 
ber of Roman Catholics in, 
392 ; principles of, condemned 
by popes, 391, 411, 419, 420, 
461 ; institutions of, considered 
godless by Jesuits, 395, 462; 
patriotism of Roman Cath- 
olics in, 422, 490; infallibility 
inconsistent with loyalty to, 

456. 

V. 

Vatican, Council of the, declared 
Pius IX infallible, 321, 427, 
428, 471, 478 ; decree of infalli- 
bility by, not unanimous, 433, 
480. 

Verona, Congress of " Holy Alli- 
ance" met at, 261. 

Victor Emmanuel, conciliatory 
letter of, to Pius IX, 23* 319, 
and note, page 320 ; entered 
Rome, 23, 322 ; his overture of 
pacification rejected by Pius 

IX, 23, 321 ; becomes king of 



INDEX. 



509 



Sardinia, 312 ; formed King- 
dom of Italy, 313. 

W. 

Washington, President, advised 
education of youth in science 
of government, 15 ; his warn- 
ing against foreign influence, 

31. 

X. 

Xaviee, Francis, his mission to 
the East Indies, 153; sent to 
India by King of Portugal, 
154 ; character assigned to him, 
154; visited Goa, 155; repre- 



sented as performing miracles, 
155, 156, 159-160, 161, 164; 
claimed for him that God gave 
him the " gift of tongues," 156, 
165; established Jesuit college 
at Goa, 157, 158 ; went to Mal- 
abar, 159 ; bis claim as the 
"Apostle of the Indies" un- 
substantiated, 162; visited 
Japan, 162-165; his gift of 
tongues a "transient favor," 
163, 164; failed to enter China, 
165 ; his death, 166 ; miracu- 
lous account of his remains, 
166, 



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